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SOCIAL  STATICS; 

OE, 

THE   CONDITIONS 


ESSENTIAL   TO 


HUMAN    HAPPINESS 

SPECIFIED, 

AND  THE  FIRST  OF  THEM  DEVELOPED, 

BY 

HERBERT  SPENCER, 


'ILLCSTKATIONS  OF  PROGRESS,"   "ESSAYS:    MORAL,  POLITICAL,  AND  ESTHETIC,' 

"  EDUCATION,"  "  FIRST  PRINCIPLES,"  "  PKINCIPLES  OF  BIOLOGY," 

"PRINCIPLES  OF  PSYCHOLOGY,"  ETC. 


WITH   A   lpin»    OF   TIIE   AUTHOR    AND   A   STEEL    PORTRAIT. 


/roBSV 


NEW  YORK  : 

D.    APPLETON    AND     COMPANY, 

443  &  445  BEOADWAY. 
1865. 


WOEKS   BY    HERBERT    SPENCER. 

PUBLISHED   BY   D.  APPLETON   &   CO. 


Miscellaneous  Writings. 

EDUCATION— INTELLECTUAL,  MORAL,  AND  PHYSICAL.  1 
vol.,  12ino.  283  pages.  Cloth. 

ILLUSTRATIONS  OF  UNIVERSAL  PROGRESS.  1  vol.,  large 
12mo.  470  pages.  Cloth. 

ESS  A  TS— MORAL,  POLITICAL,  AND  AESTHETIC.  1  vol.,  large 
12mo.  386  pages. 

SOCIAL  STATICS;  or,  the  conditions  essential  to  human  happiness 
specified,  and  the  first  of  them  developed.  1  vol.,  large  12mo.  523  pages. 

THE  CLASSIFICATION  OF  THE  SCIENCES;  to  which  is  added 
reasons  fo*  dissenting  from  the  Philosophy  of  M.  Comte.  A  pamphlet  of  50 
pages.  Fine  paper. 

System  of  Philosophy. 

FIRST  PRINCIPLES,  IN  Two  PARTS—!.  The  Unknowable;  II. 
Laws  of  the  Knowable.  1  vol.,  large  12mo.  508  pages.  Cloth. 

NOW  IN  PRESS  : 
PRINCIPLES  OF  BIOLOGY.    Vol.  1,  large  12mo.    475  pages. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1865, 
By  D.  APPLETON  &  COMPANY, 

in  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  United  States  for  the 
Southern  District  of  New  York. 


MB 


INTRODUCTORY  NOTICE 


MR.  HERBERT  SPENCER  is  a  native  of  Derby,  England,  where 
he  was  born,  and  where  his  father  and  mother  still  live.  For  two 
generations  the  occupation  of  his  family  has  been  that  of  teach 
ing — his  grandfather  having  kept  the  chief  school  in  Derby  (after 
the  grammar  school),  and  his  father  having  adopted  the  same  pro 
fession. 

Herbert  was  the  only  surviving  child,  and  his  health  was  so 
delicate  that  his  parents  had  but  little  hope  of  raising  him.  His 
father,  who  had  paid  much  attention  to  the  subject  of  physical 
development,  gave  such  a  direction  to  his  child's  early  education 
as  was  suited  to  the  feebleness  of  his  constitution.  He  brought 
him  up  as  much  as  possible  in  the  open  air,  and  sought,  by  grad 
ual  and  judicious  exercise,  to  strengthen  his  muscles  and  invigorate 
his  constitution.  Feeling  the  danger  of  exposing  him  to  the  usual 
course  of  education,  he  kept  him  from  school,  and  attended  to  his 
instruction  chiefly  himself. 

A  correspondent  of  the  Independent  who  knew  the  family  in 
Derby  several  years  ago,  and  who  derived  from  Mr.  Spencer's 
father  several  particulars  of  the  mode  of  conducting  his  son's  cul 
ture,  remarks  that  his  method  was  to  begin  with  the  explanation  of 
the  properties  and  laws  of  external  objects.  He  never  gave  him 


IV  INTRODUCTORY   NOTICE. 

books  to  study  till  he  had  clearly  imparted  to  him  the  principles 
of  the  subject  he  was  about  to  take  up.  Every  care  was  taken  to 
teach  him  accurately,  so  that  no  labor  should  be  lost  in  unlearning 
errors. 

Having  received  his  early  education  mainly  from  his  father, 
Mr.  Spencer  passed  several  years  with  his  uncle,  the  Rev.  Thomas 
Spencer,  a  cultivated  scholar  and  a  clergyman  of  the  Established 
Church,  who  was  noted  for  his  very  liberal  opinions  and  his  phi 
lanthropic  activity,  and  who  will  be  remembered  by  some  as  hav 
ing,  about  eighteen  years  ago,  made  a  tour  through  this  country 
delivering  occasional  lectures. 

Mr.  Spencer  early  showed  a  marked  aptitude  for  mechanics 
and  mathematics ;  and  his  father,  feeling  that  a  literary  career  was 
out  of  the  question,  turned  his  studits  mainly  in  the  direction  of 
civil  engineering,  by  which  he  proposed  to  secure  for  him  a  life 
of  out-door  activity  and  useful  employment  without  imperilling  his 
health.  This  was  quite  in  consonance  with  his  inclinations ;  and 
having  finished  his  education  with  his  uncle,  Mr.  Spencer,  then 
seventeen  years  of  age,  commenced  life  as  a  civil  engineer.  He 
engaged  first  under  Mr.  Charles  Fox,  a  gentleman  who  had  been 
a  pupil  of  his  father's,  and  who  some  years  since  became  widely 
known  as  the  builder  of  the  Great  Exhibition  Building  of  1850. 

After  some  eight  years  spent  in  the  profession  Mr.  Spencer 
abandoned  it,  chiefly  in  consequence  of  the  excessive  competition 
caused  by  the  large  numbers  who  flocked  into  it.  During  this 
period,  however,  he  published  various  papers  in  the  Civil  Engi 
neers''  and  Architects'  Journal.  His  first  productions  in  general  lit 
erature  were  in  the  shape  of  a  scries  of  letters  on  the  Proper 
Sphere  of  Government,  published  in  the  Non- Conformist  newspa 
per  in  1842.  These  were  some  time  afterwards  reprinted  as  a 
pamphlet.  The  attention  which  they  drew  was  a  chief  cause  of 
the  subsequent  adoption  of  literature  as  an  occupation ;  a  step 
which  was  taken  after  the  reaction  from  the  railway  mania  of 
1845  had  led  to  an  extreme  depression  in  the  engineering  world. 


INTKODTJCTOEY   NOTICE.  V 

From  1848  to  1852  Mr.  Spencer  held  an  engagement  on  the 
Economist  newspaper,  then  under  the  editorship  of  the  proprietor, 
Mr.  James  Wilson,  M.  P.  It  was  during  this  period  of  connection 
with  the  Economist  that  "  Social  Statics  "  was  written  and  pub 
lished.  It  was  favorably  received,  and  shortly  after  led  to  an  in 
vitation  to  contribute  to  the  Westminster  Review.  This  connec 
tion  became  established ;  and  other  such  opportunities  offering, 
Mr.  Spencer  was  led  to  relinquish  his  connection  with  the  Econo 
mist  and  devote  himself  to  the  writing  of  articles  for  the  Quarterly 
Keviews. 

"  Social  Statics,"  of  which  the  present  volume  is  a  reprint, 
was  published  in  1850.  In  1855  appeared  Mr.  Spencer's  profound 
and  original  book  entitled  the  "  Principles  of  Psychology."  In 
1857  he  collected  and  published  several  of  his  contributions  to 
the  English  periodicals,  under  the  title  of  "  Essays ;  Scientific, 
Political  and  Speculative,"  and  in  18G3  he  issued  a  second  series 
'  with  the  same  title.  Four  more  essays  were  also  published  in  a 
volume  entitled  "  Education ;  Intellectual,  Moral  and  Physical." 

In  1860  Mr.  Spencer  began  the  issue,  by  subscription,  of  a  sys 
tem  of  philosophy  of  a  very  comprehensive  character,  and  de 
signed  to  occupy  several  years  in  its  ^accomplishment.  The  aim" 
of  this  work  is  to  bring  the  vast  resources  of  modern  science  to 
bear  upon  the  construction  of  a  complete  philosophical  scheme 
that  shall  embrace  the  great  departments  of  Life,  of  Mind,  and 
of  Society.  The  plan  involves  five  divisions.  It  begins  with  an 
inquiry  into  First  Principles,  or  the  establishment  of  those  univer 
sal  laws  which  control  all  phenomena,  and  therefore  underlie  all 
branches  of  investigation.  This  part  develops  the  author's  method, 
and  lays  down  the  principles  to  be  employed  as  guides  and  tests 
in  the  succeeding  works.  Next  comes  the  "  Principles  of  Biolo 
gy,"  or  an  exposition  of  the  general  laws  and  scheme  of  life  ;  to  be 
followed  by  the  "  Principles  of  Psychology,"  or  the  science  of 
mind  in  its  broadest  aspects.  These  works  in  logical  order  pre 
pare  for  the  consideration  of  the  "  Principles  of  Sociology,"  or 


VI  INTRODUCTORY  NOTICE. 

the  natural  laws  of  society ;  and  lastly,  the  truths  furnished  by 
the  comprehensive  study  of  man  in  .his  bodily,  mental,  and  social 
relations,  will  be  used  to  throw  light  upon  the  final  inquiry  into 
the  "Principles  of  Morality,"  or  the  true  laws  of  the  regulation 
of  human  conduct. 

To  the  obvious  criticism  that  the  scheme  he  has  thus  under 
taken  is  too  extensive  for  any  one  man  to  carry  out,  Mr.  Spencer 
replies,  that  an  exhaustive  treatment  of  each  topic  is  not  intended, 
but  simply  the  establishment  of  principles,  with  such  illustrations 
as  are  needed  to  make  their  bearings  fully  understood.  And  fur 
ther,  that  impossible  though  it  may  prove  to  execute  the  whole, 
yet  nothing  can  be  said  against  an  attempt  to  set  forth  the  First 
Principles,  and  to  carry  their  application  as  far  as  circumstances 
permit.  And  it  may  be  added,  that  the  very  considerable  portion 
of  the  work  already  done  not  only  gives  confident  assurance  of  its 
successful  accomplishment,  but  demonstrates  moreover  that  the 
work  has  been  undertaken  by  the  right  man. 

It  may  be  stated  that  Mr.  Spencer's  health  is  precarious,  and 
has  been  at  times  so  disturbed  as  somewhat  to  interrupt  the  pro 
gress  of  his  work,  and  occasion  serious  solicitude  on  the  part  of  his 
friends ;  but  he  is  latterly  reported  in  quite  as  good  health  as  he 
usually  enjoys,  notwithstanding  the  severe  labor  of  the  last  three 
or  four  years  upon  his  System  of  Philosophy.  ResidiDg  in  Lon 
don,  with  its  vast  facilities  for  the  pursuit  of  science,  intimate 
with  the  representative-men  in  various  departments  of  investiga 
tion  of  whose  criticisms  and  suggestions  he  constantly  avails  him 
self,  and  inflexibly  refusing  to  be  drawn  into  other  things,  Mr. 
Spencer  concentrates  his  entire  power  upon  the  execution  of  his 
great  plan,  and  we  cannot  but  hope  with  a  reasonable  prospect  of 
success. 

The  present  volume,  the  first  and  most  popularly  written  of  all 
his  works,  has  an  interest  not  only  for  the  intrinsic  value  and  im 
portance  of  its  discussions,  but  as  foreshadowing  the  philosophi 
cal  scheme  which  it  has  become  the  business  of  his  life  to  unfold. 


INTRODUCTORY   NOTICE.  * 

With  various  things,  perhaps,  that  he  cannot  accept,  the  reader 
will  find  the  great  subjects  of  society,  the  laws  of  social  growth 
and  improvement,  the  rights,  claims,  and  duties  of  various  classes 
of  the  community,  and  the  philosophy  of  education,  government, 
and  human  progress  considered  as  problems  of  science,  and  with 
the  author's  usual  affluence  of  illustration  and  remarkable  powers 
of  reasoning.  But  he  will  further  find  that  tlie  work  involves  a 
fundamental  organizing  thought ;  that  of  Evolution,  which  has  be 
come  the  central  and  governing  idea  of  all  his  philosophical  la 
bors.  The  principle  is  here  regarded  in  its  immediate  and  prac 
tical  bearings  upon  social  phenomena,  and  affords  an  admirable 
introduction  to  the  more  extended,  definite,  and  systematic  eluci 
dation  of  it  upon  which  he  is  now  engaged.  In  the  preface  to 
the  present  edition  Mr.  Spencer  has  referred  to  the  subsequent  de 
velopment  of  his  views,  and  called  attention  to  some  modifica 
tions  in  the  details  of  their  application.  These,  however,  are 
minor  points  which  do  not  affect  the  scope  and  force  of  the  gen 
eral  argument,  or  disturb  the  security  of  his  main  conclusions. 
They  are  interesting  as  showing  the  growth  of  his  method  in  the 
author's  mind,  and  happily  he  has  made  record  of  the  influences 
which  chiefly  contributed  to  it.  In  a  recent  pamphlet  *  Mr.  Spen 
cer  remarks : 

And  now  let  me  point  out  that  which  really  has  exercised  a 
profound  influence  over  my  course  of  thought.  The  truth  which 
Harvey's  embryological  inquiries  first  dimly  indicated,  which  was 
more  clearly  perceived  by  Wolff  and  Goethe,  and  which  was  put 
into  a  definite  shape  by  Von  Baer — the  truth  that  all  organic  de 
velopment  is  a  change  from  a  state  of  homogeneity  to  a  state  of 
heterogeneity — this  it  is  from  which  very  many  of  the  conclusions 
which  I  now  hold,  have  indirectly  resulted.  In  "  Social  Statics," 
there  is  everywhere  manifested  a  dominant  belief  in  the  evolution 
of  man  and  of  society.  There  is  also  manifested  the  belief  that 
this  evolution  is  in  both  cases  determined  by  the  incidence  of 

*  The  Classification  of  the  Sciences :  with  Beasons  for  DissentiDg  from  the  Philos 
ophy  of  M.  Comte. 


•Vlll  INTEODUCTOKY   NOTICE. 

conditions — the  actions  of  circumstances.     And  there  is  further 

\  a  recognition  of  the  fact  that  organic  and  social  evolutions  con 
form  to  the  same  law.  Falling  amid  beliefs  in  evolutions  of  va 
rious  orders,  everywhere  determined  by  natural  causes  (beliefs 
again  displayed  in  the  "Theory  of  Population  "  and  in  the  "Prin 
ciples  of  Psychology  ")  ;  the  formula  of  Yon  Baer  acted  as  an  organ- 

^  izing  principle.  The  extension  of  it  to  other  kinds  of  phenom 
ena  than  those  of  individual  and  social  organization,  is  traceable 
through  successive  stages.  It  may  be  seen  in  the  last  paragraph 
of  an  essay  on  "The  Philosophy  of  Style,"  published  in  1852; 
again  in  an  essay  on  "  Manners  and  Fashion,"  published  in  1854  ; 
and  then,  in  a  comparatively  advanced  form,  in  an  essay  on 

N  "  Progress  :  its  Law  and  Cause,"  published  in  1857.  Afterwards, 
there  came  the  recognition  of  the  need  for  further  limitation  of 
this  formula ;  next  the  inquiry  into  those  general  laws  of  force 
from  which  this  universal  transformation  necessarily  results  ;  next 
the  deduction  of  these  from  the  ultimate  law  of  the  persistence 
of  force  ;  next  the  perception  that  there  is  everywhere  a  process 
of  Dissolution  complementary  to  that  of  Evolution ;  and,  finally, 
the  determination  of  the  conditions  under  which  Evolution  and 
Dissolution  respectively  occur.  The  filiation  of  these  results  is, 
I  think,  tolerably  manifest.  The  process  has  been  one  of  contin- 

"**  uous  development,  set  up  by  the  addition  of  Von  Baer's  law  to  a 
number  of  ideas  that  were  in  harmony  with  it. 

The  various  reviews  of  Mr.  Spencer's  writings  show  a  widely 
prevailing  impression  that  he  is  a  disciple  of  the  French  Philoso 
pher  Comte,  who  represents  what  is  called  the  '  Positive'  school  of 
modern  thought.  In  the  very  able  pamphlet  from  which  the  fore 
going  extract  is  made,  Mr.  Spencer  takes  pains  to  correct  this 
erroneous  impression,  and  to  show  that  the  differences  between 
himself  and  Comte  are  not  only  numerous  and  important,  but  that 
N  he  rejects  all  that  is  distinctive  of  the  Frenchman's  system.  We 
quote  some  passages  which  have  a  bearing  upon  the  title  and 
character  of  the  present  work : 

Joined  with  the  ambiguous  use  of  the  phrase  "  Positive 
Philosophy,"  which  has  led  to  a  classing  with  M.  Comte  of  many 
men  who  either  ignore  or  reject  his  distinctive  principles,  there 


INTRODUCTORY   NOTICE.  IX 

has  been  one  special  circumstance  that  has  tended  to  originate 
and  maintain  this  classing  in  my  own  case.  The  assumption  of 
some  relationship  between  M.  Comte  and  myself,  was  unavoidably 
raised  by  the  title  of  my  first  book — "  Social  Statics."  When  that 
book  was  published,  I  was  unaware  that  this  title  had  been  before 
used  :  had  I  known  the  fact,  I  should  certainly  have  adopted  an 
alternative  title  which  I  had  in  view.*  If,  however,  instead  of 
the  title,  the  work  itself  be  considered,  its  irrelatlon  to  the  phi 
losophy  of  M.  Comte  becomes  abundantly  manifest.  There  is 
decisive  testimony  on  this  point.  In  the  North  British  Review  for 
August,  1851,  a  reviewer  of  "Social  Statics"  says: 

"  The  title  of  this  work,  however,  is  a  complete  misnomer.  According 
to  all  analogy,  the  phrase  "Social  Statics"  should  be  used  only  in  some 
such  sense  as  that  in  which,  as  we  have  already  explained,  it  is  used  by 
Comte,  namely  as  designating  a  branch  of  inquiry  whose  end  it  is  to  ascer 
tain  the  laws  of  social  equilibrium  or  order,  as  distinct  ideally  from  those 
of  social  movement  or  progress.  Of  this  Mr.  Spencer  does  not  seem  to 
have  had  the  slightest  notion,  but  to  have  chosen  the  name  for  his  work 
only  as  a  means  of  indicating  vaguely  that  it  proposed  to  treat  of  social 
concerns  in  a  scientific  manner."  p.  321. 

Respecting  M.  Comte's  application  of  the  words  statics  and 
dynamics  to  social  phenomena,  now  that  I  know  what  it  is,  I  will 
only  say  that  while  I  perfectly  understand  how,  by  a  defensible 
extension  of  their  mathematical  meanings,  the  one  may  be  used 

*  I  believed  at  the  time,  and  have  never  doubted  until  now,  that  the  choice  of  this 
title  was  absolutely  independent  of  its  previous  use  by  M.  Comte.  While  writing 
these  pages,  I  have  found  reason  to  think  the  contrary.  On  referring  to  "  Social  Stat 
ics,"  to  see  what  were  my  views  of  social  evolution  in  1850,  when  M.  Comte  was  to 
me  but  a  name,  I  met  with  the  following  sentence : — "  Social  philosophy  may  be  aptly 
divided  (as  political  economy  has  been)  into  statics  and  dynamics."  This  I  remem 
bered  to  be  a  reference  to  a  division  which  I  had  seen  in  the  Political  Economy  of  Mr. 
Mill.  But  why  had  I  not  mentioned  Mr.  Mill's  name  ?  On  referring  to  the  first  edi 
tion  of  his  work,  I  found,  at  the  opening  of  Book  iv.,  this  sentence : — "  The  three  pre 
ceding  parts  include  as  detailed  a  view  as  the  limits  of  this  treatise  permit,  of  what, 
by  a  happy  generalization  of  a  mathematical  phrase,  has  been  called  the  Statics  of  the 
subject."  Here  was  the  solution  of  the  question.  The  division  had  not  been  made  by 
Mr.  Mill,  but  by  some  writer  (on  Political  Economy  I  supposed)  who  was  not  named 
by  him ;  and  whom  I  did  not  know.  It  is  now  manifest,  however,  that  while  I  sup 
posed  I  was  giving  a  more  extended  use  to  this  division,  I  was  but  returning  to  the 
original  use  which  Mr.  Mill  had  limited  to  his  special  topic.  Another  thing  is,  I  think, 
tolerably  manifest.  As  I  evidently  wished  to  point  out  my  obligation  to  some  un 
known  political  economist,  whose  division  I  thought  I  was  extending,  I  should  have 
named  him  had  I  known  who  he  was.  And  in  that  case  should  not  have  put  this  ex 
tension  of  the  division  as  though  it  were  new.  ' 
1 


X  INTRODUCTORY   NOTICE. 

to  indicate  social  functions  in  balance,  and  the  other  social 
functions  out  of  balance,  I  am  quite  at  a  loss  to  understand  how 
the  phenomena  of  structure  can  be  included  in  the  one  any  more 
than  in  the  other.  But  the  two  things  which  here  concern  me, 
are,  first,  to  point  out  that  I  had  not  "•  the  slightest  notion "  of 
giving  Social  Statics  the  meaning  which  M.  Comte  gave  it ;  and, 
second,  to  explain  the  meaning  which  I  did  give  it.  The  units 
of  any  aggregate  of  matter,  are  in  equilibrium  when  they  sever 
ally  act  and  re-act  upon  each  other  on  all  sides  with  equal  forces. 
A  state  of  change  among  them  implies  that  there  are  forces  exer 
cised  by  some  that  are  not  counterbalanced  by  like  forces  exer 
cised  by  others ;  and  a  state  of  rest  implies  the  absence  of  such 
uncounterbalanced  forces — implies,  if  the  units  are  homogeneous, 
equal  distances  among  them — implies  a  maintenance  of  their  re 
spective  spheres  of  molecular  motion.  Similarly  among  the  units 
of  a  society,  the  fundamental  condition  to  equilibrium  is,  that 
the  restraining  forces  which  the  units  exercise  on  each  other,  shall 
be  balanced.  If  the  spheres  of  action  of  some  units  are  dimin 
ished  by  extension  of  the  spheres  of  action  of  others,  there  neces 
sarily  results  an  unbalanced  force  which  tends  to  produce  politi 
cal  change  in  the  relations  of  individuals ;  and  the  tendency  to 
change  can  cease,  only  when  individuals  cease  to  aggress  on  each 
other's  spheres  of  action — only  when  there  is  maintained,  that  law 
of  equal  freedom,  which  it  was  the  purpose  of  "  Social  Statics  "  to 
enforce  in  all  its  consequences.  Besides  this  totally-unlike  con 
ception  of  what  constitutes  Social  Statics,  the  work  to  which  I 
applied  that  title,  is  fundamentally  at  variance  with  M.  Comte's 
teachings  in  almost  every  thing.  So  far  from  alleging,  as  M. 
Comte  does,  that  society  is  to  be  reorganized  by  philosophy ; 
it  alleges  that  society  is  to  be  reorganized  only  by  the  accumu 
lated  effects  of  habit  on  character.  Its  aim  is  not  the  increase 
of  authoritative  control  over  citizens,  but  the  decrease  of  it.  A 
more  pronounced  individualism,  instead  of  a  more  pronounced 
nationalism,  is  its  ideal.  So  profoundly  is  my  political  creed  at 
variance  with  the  creed  of  M.  Comte,  that,  unless  I  am  misin 
formed,  it  has  been  instanced  by  a  leading  English  disciple  of  M. 
Comte,  as  the  creed  to  which  he  has  the  greatest  aversion.  One 
point  of  coincidence,  however,  is  recognizable.  The  analogy  be 
tween  an  individual  organism  and  a  social  organism,  which  was 
held  by  Plato  and  by  Hobbes,'  is  asserted  in  "  Social  Statics,"  as 


INTKODUCTOEY   NOTICE.  xi 

it  is  in  the  "  Sociology"  of  M.  Comte.  Very  rightly,  M.  Comte 
has  made  this  analogy  the  cardinal  idea  of  this  division  of  his 
philosophy.  In  "  Social .  Statics,"  the  aim  of  which  is  essentially 
ethical,  this  analogy  is  pointed  out  incidentally,  to  enforce  certain 
ethical  considerations ;  and  is  there  obviously  suggested  partly  by 
the  definition  of  life  which  Coleridge  derived  from  Schelling,  and 
partly  by  the  generalizations  of  physiologists  there  referred  to 
(chap.  xxx.  §§  12,  13,  16).  Excepting  this  incidental  agreement, 
however,  the  contents  of  "  Social  Statics  "  are  so  wholly  antag 
onistic  to  the  philosophy  of  M.  Comte,  that,  but  for  the  title,  the 
work  would  never,  I  think,  have  raised  the  remembrance  of  him — 
unless,  indeed,  by  the  association  of  opposites.* 

The  appearance  of  the  present  volume  completes  the  American 
republication  of  Mr.  Spencer's  miscellaneous  works.  It  is  hoped 
that  it  may  meet  with  the  same  cordial  welcome  which  has  been 
accorded  to  its  predecessors,  and  that  the  success  of  these  works 
will  justify  the  Publishers  in  reissuing  the  successive  volumes  of 
the  System  of  Philosophy  as  they  appear  from  the  pen  of  the 
author. 

NEW  YORK",  March  10, 1865. 

*  Let  me  add  that  the  conception  developed  in  "  Social  Statics,"  dates  back  to  a  series 
of  letters  on  the  "  Proper  Sphere  of  Government,"  published  in  the  Nonconformist 
newspaper,  in  the  latter  half  of  1842,  and  republished  as  a  pamphlet  in  1843.  In  these 
letters  will  be  found,  along  with  many  crude  ideas,  the  same  belief  in  the  conformity 
of  social  phenomena  to  unvariable  laws ;  the  same  belief  in  human  progression  as  de 
termined  by  such  laws ;  the  same  belief  in  the  moral  modification  of  men  as  caused 
by  social  discipline ;  the  same  belief  in  the  tendency  of  social  arrangements  "  of  them 
selves  to  assume  a  condition  of  stable  equilibrium ; "  the  same  repudiation  of  state- 
control  over  various  departments  of  social  life ;  the  same  limitation  of  state-action  to 
the  maintenance  of  equitable  relations  among  citizens.  The  writing  of  "  Social  Statics  " 
arose  from  a  dissatisfaction  with  the  basis  on  which  the  doctrines  set  forth  in  those 
letters  were  placed ;  the  second  half  of  that  work  is  an  elaboration  of  these  doctrines ; 
and  the  first  half  a  statement  of  the  principles  from  which  they  are  deducible. 


AUTHOR'S  PREFACE 

TO    THE    AMERICAN    EDITION. 


THE  author  desires  it  to  be  understood  that  the  re 
print  of  Social  Statics ',  herewith  issued  to  the  American 
public,  must  not  be  taken  as  a  literal  expression  of  his 
present  views.  During  the  fourteen  years  that  have 
elapsed  since  the  original  publication  of  the  work,  the 
general  theory  which  it  enunciates  has  undergone,  in  his 
mind,  considerable  further  development  and  some  ac 
companying  modifications.  So  that,  though  he  adheres 
to  the  leading  principles  set  forth  in  the  following  pages, 
he  is  not  prepared  to  abide  by  all  the  detailed  applica 
tions  of  them. 

The  bases  of  Morality  laid  down  in  Part  I.,  and  in 
the  preliminary  chapters  of  Part  II.,  must  be  regarded 
as  but  adumbrations  of  what  he  holds  to  be  the  true 
bases.  Though  in  the  main  correct  as  far  as  they  go, 
they  are  incompletely  worked  out,  and  form  but  a  moiety 
of  the  groundwork  on  which  a  scientific  system  of  Eth 
ics  must  rest. 


XIV  PEEFACE. 

The  deductions  included  in  Part  II.  may  be  taken  as 
representing,  in  great  measure,  those  which  the  author 
would  still  draw ;  but  had  he  now  to  express  them,  he 
would  express  some  of  them  differently.  Especially  in 
the  chapters  on  "  The  Rights  of  Women,"  and  on  "  The 
Eights  of  Children,"  he  would  make  qualifications  which, 
while  they  left  the  arguments  much  as  they  are,  would 
alter  somewhat  their  logical  aspects. 

Similarly  of  the  deductions  which  make  up  Part  III. 
The  doctrines  there  enunciated  respecting  Political 
Eights,  State  Functions,  and  the  Limitations  of  State 
Functions,  are  such  as,  in  their  general  characters,  the 
author  continues  to  hold.  But  in  re-stating  them  he 
would  bring  into  greater  prominence  the  transitional  na 
ture  of  all  political  institutions,  and  the  consequent  rela 
tive  goodness  of  some  arrangements  which  have  no  claims 
to  absolute  goodness. 

If  it  be  a£ked  why  the  author  does  not  so  remodel 
the  work  as  to  make  it  accurately  represent  his  present 
opinions,  the  reply  is  that  he  could  not  do  this  satisfac 
torily  without  an  amount  of  labor  that  would  require 
him  to  suspend  the  issue  of  the  "  System  of  Philoso 
phy  "  on  which  he  is  now  engaged.  When,  however,  he 
comes  to  the  closing  volumes  of  this  System,  should  he 
ever  get  so  far,  he  proposes  to  set  forth  in  them  the  de 
veloped  conclusions  of  which  Social  Statics  must  be  re 
garded  as  a  rough  sketch. 

LONDON,  Nov.  16, 1864. 


PREFACE. 


BEING  somewhat  at  variance  with  precedent,  the  tone 
and  mode  of  treatment  occasionally  adopted  in  the  fol 
lowing  pages  will,  perhaps,  provoke  criticism.  Whether, 
in  thus  innovating  upon  established  usage,  the  writer 
has  acted  judiciously  or  otherwise,  the  event  must  deter 
mine.  He  has  not,  however,  transgressed  without  ade 
quate  motive ;  having  done  so  under  the  belief  that,  as 
it  is  the  purpose  of  a  book  to  influence  conduct,  the  best 
way  of  writing  a  book  must  be  the  way  best  fitted  to 
effect  this  purpose. 

Should  exception  be  taken  to  the  manifestations  of 
feeling  now  and  then  met  with,  as  out  of  place  in  a  trea 
tise  having  so  scientific  a  title ;  it  is  replied  that,  in  their 
present  phase  of  progress,  men  are  but  little  swayed  by 
purely  intellectual  considerations — that  to  be  operative, 
these  must  be  enforced  by  direct  or  implied  appeals  to 
the  sentiments — and  that,  provided  such  appeals  are  not 
in  place  of,  but  merely  supplementary  to,  the  deductions 
of  logic,  no  well-grounded  objection  can  be  made  to 
them.  The  reader  will  find  that  the  several  conclusions 


XVI  PREFACE. 

submitted  to  him  are  primarily  based  on  entirely  imper 
sonal  reasoning,  by  which  alone  they  may  be  judged ; 
and  if,  for  the  sake  of  commending  these  conclusions  to 
the  many,  the  sympathies  have  been  indirectly  addressed, 
the  general  argument  cannot  have  been  thereby  weak 
ened,  if  it  has  not  been  strengthened. 

Possibly  the  relaxations  of  style  in  some  cases  used, 
will  be  censured,  as  beneath  the  gravity  of  the  subject. 
In  defence  of  them  it  may  be  urged,  that  the  measured 
movement  which  custom  prescribes  for  philosophical 
works,  is  productive  of  a  monotony  extremely  repulsive 
to  the  generality  of  readers.  That  no  counterbalancing 
advantages  are  obtained,  the  writer  does  not  assert. 
But,  for  his  own  part,  he  has  preferred  to  sacrifice  some 
what  of  conventional  dignity,  in  the  hope  of  rendering 
his  theme  interesting  to  a  larger  number. 

LONDON,  December,  1850. 


CONTENTS 


INTRODUCTION,       .  .  .  .  .  .  .  n 

The  Doctrine  of  Expediency,        .  .  .  .  .11 

The  Doctrine  of  the  Moral  Sense,        ...  28 

Lemma  L,  .......      44 

Lemma  II.,    .......  51 


PART  I. 

CIIAP.  I. — Definition  of  Morality,         .            .            .            .  .69 

II. — The  Evanescence  of  Evil,         ....  73 

III. — The  Divine  Idea,  and  the  Conditions  of  its  Realization,  81 

PART  II. 

IY.— Derivation  of_aJirat.Prinp.ip1p)       .            .            .  .91 

V. — Secondary  Derivation  of  a  First  Principle,        .            .  107 

VI.— First  Principle,        .             .             .             .             .  .121 

VII. — Application  of  this  First  Principle,        .             .             .  128 

VIII.— The  Rights  of  Life  and  Personal  Liberty,               .  .130 

IX.— The  Right  to  the  Use  of  the  Earth,      .            .            .  131 
1* 


XV111  CONTENTS. 

CHAP.  X.— The  Right  of  Property,      . 

XI. — The  Right  of  Property  in  Ideas, 
XII.— The  Right  of  Property  in  Character, 
XIII.— The  Right  of  Exchange, 
XIV.— The  Right  of  Free  Speech, 
XV.— Further  Rights, 
XVI.— The  Rights  of  Women,     . 
XVII.— The  Rights  of  Children, 

PART  in. 

XVIIL— Political  Rights, 
XIX. — The  Right  to  Ignore  the  State, 
XX.— The  Constitution  of  the  State, 
XXI. — The  Duty  of  the  State, 
XXII.— The_Limit  of  State-Duty, 
XXIII. — The  Regulation  oFCommerce, 
XXIV.— Religious  Establishments, 
XXV. — Poor-Laws,      .         •  .i 
XXVL— National  Education, 
XXVII. — Government  Colonization, 
XXVIII. — Sanitary  Supervision,       ... 
XXIX.— Currency,  Postal  Arrangements,  etc., 

PART  IV. 

XXX. — General  Considerations, 
XXXI. — Summary,        .  ... 

XXXII. — Conclusion, 


UNIVERSITY 

/V  .         r>v 

£4%rt» 

INTRODUCTION. 


THE   DOCTRINE    OF   EXPEDIENCY. 

§  1.  "  Give  us  a  guide,"  cry  men  to  the  philosopher. 
"  We  would  escape  from  these  miseries  in  which  we  are 
entangled.  A  better  state  is  ever  present  to  our  imagina 
tions,  and  we  yearn  after  it ;  but  all  our  efforts  to  realize 
it  are  fruitless.  We  are  weary  of  perpetual  failures ;  tell 
us  by  what  rule  we  may  attain  our  desire." 

"  Whatever  is  expedient  is  right ; "  is  one  of  the  last 
of  the  many  replies  to  this  appeal. 

"  True,"  rejoin  some  of  the  applicants.  "  With  the 
Deity  right  and  expedient  are  doubtless  convertible  terms. 
For  us,  however,  there  remains  the  question,  Which  is  the 
antecedent,  and  which  is  the  consequent  ?  Granting  your 
assumption  that  right  is  the  unknown  quantity  and  expe 
diency  the  known  one,  your  formula  may  be  serviceable. 
But  we  deny  your  premises ;  a  painful  experience  has  proved 
the  two  to  be  equally  indeterminate.  Nay,  we  begin  to 
suspect  that  the  right  is  the  more  easily  ascertained  of  the 
two ;  and  that  your  maxim  would  be  better  if  transposed 
into — whatever  is  right  is  expedient." 

"  Let  your  rule  be,  the  greatest  happiness  to  the  great 
est  number,"  interposes  another  authority. 


INTRODUCTION. 

"  That,  like  the  other,  is  no  rule  at  all,"  it  is  replied ; 
"  but  rather  an  enunciation  of  the  problem  to  be  solved. 
It  is  your  i  greatest  happiness '  of  which  we  have  been  so 
long  and  so  fruitlessly  in  search ;  albeit  we  never  gave  it 
a  name.  You  tell  us  nothing  new ;  you  merely  give 
words  to  our  want.  What  you  call  an  answer,  is  simply 
our  own  question  turned  the  right  side  up.  If  this  is  your 
philosophy  it  is  surely  empty,  for  it  merely  echoes  the 
interrogation." 

"  Have  a  little  patience,"  returns  the  moralist,  "  and  I 
will  give  you  my  opinion  as  to  the  mode  of  securing  this 
greatest  happiness  to  the  greatest  number." 

"  There  again,"  exclaim  the  objectors,  "  you  mistake 
our  requirement.  We  want  something  else  than  opinions. 
We  have  had  enough  of  them.  Every  futile  scheme  for 
the  general  good  has  been  based  on  opinion ;  and  we  have 
no  guarantee  that  your  plan  will  not  add  one  to  the  list 
of  failures.  Have  you  discovered  a  means  of  forming  an 
infallible  judgment?  If  not,  you  are,  for  aught  we  can 
perceive,  as  much  in  the  dark  as  ourselves.  True,  you 
have  obtained  a  clearer  view  of  the  end  to  be  arrived  at ; 
but  concerning  the  route  leading  to  it,  your  offer  of  an 
opinion  proves  that  you  know  nothing  more  certain  than 
we  do.  We  demur  to  your  maxim  because  it  is  not  what 
we  wanted — a  guide ;  because  it  dictates  no  sure  mode  of 
securing  the  desideratum ;  because  it  puts  no  veto  upon  a 
mistaken  policy ;  because  it  permits  all  actions — bad,  as 
readily  as  good — provided  only  the  actors  believe  them 
conducive  to  the  prescribed  end.  Your  doctrines  of 
1  expediency'  or  '  utility '  or  l  general  good  '  or  '  greatest 
happiness  to  the  greatest  number '  afford  not  a  solitary 
command  of  a  practical  character.  Let  but  rulers  think, 
or  profess  to  think,  that  their  measures  will  benefit  the 
community,  and  your  philosophy  stands  mute  in  the 
presence  of  the  most  egregious  folly,  or  the  blackest  mis- 


THE   CLAIM    OF   PHILOSOPHY.  13 

conduct.  This  will  not  do  for  us.  We  seek  a  system 
that  can  return  a  definite  answer  when  we  ask — '  Is  this 
act  good  ? '  and  not  like  yours,  reply — '  Yes,  if  it  will 
benefit  you.'  If  you  can  show  us  such  an  one — if  you  can 
give  us  an  axiom  from  which  we  may  develop  successive 
propositions  until  we  have  with  mathematical  certainly 
solved  all  our  difficulties — we  will  thank  you.  If  not,  we 
must  go  elsewhere." 

In  his  defence,  our  philosopher  submits  that  such 
expectations  are  unreasonable.  He  doubts  the  possibility 
of  a  strictly  scientific  morality.  Moreover  he  maintains 
that  his  system  is  sufficient  for  all  practical  purposes. 
He  has  definitely  pointed  out  the  goal  to  be  attained.  He 
has  surveyed  the  tract  lying  between  us  and  it.  He  be 
lieves  he  has  discovered  the  best  route.  And  finally  he 
has  volunteered  as  pioneer.  Having  done  this  be  claims 
to  have  performed  all  that  can  be  expected  of  him,  and 
deprecates  the  opposition  of  these  critics  as  factious,  and 
their  objections  as  frivolous.  Let  us  examine  this  posi 
tion  somewhat  more  closely. 

§  2.  Assuming  it  to  be  in  other  respects  satisfactory, 
a  rule,  principle,  or  axiom,  is  valuable  only  in  so  far  as 
the  words  in  which  it  is  expressed  have  a  definite  mean 
ing.  The  terms  used  must  be  universally  accepted  in  the 
same  sense,  otherwise  the  proposition  will  be- *  liable  to 
such  various  constructions,  as  to  lose  all  claim  to  the 
title — a  rule.  We  must  therefore  take  it  for  granted  that 
when  he  announced  "  the  greatest  happiness  to  the  great 
est  number  "  as  the  canon  of  social  morality,  its  originator 
supposed  mankind  to  be  unanimous  in  their  definition  of 
"  greatest  happiness." 

This  was  a  most  unfortunate  assumption,  for  no  fact  is  -* 
more  palpable  than  that  the  standard  of  happiness  is  in 
finitely  variable.     In  all  ages — amongst  every  people — by 


INTRODUCTION. 

each  class — do  we  find  different  notions  of  it  entertained. 
To  the  wandering  gipsy  a  home  is  tiresome ;  whilst  a 
Swiss  is  miserable  without  one.  Progress  is  necessary  to 
the  well-being  of  the  Anglo-Saxons ;  on  the  other  hand 
the  Esquimaux  are  content  in  their  squalid  poverty,  have 
no  latent  wants,  and  are  still  what  they  were  in  the  days 
of  Tacitus.  An  Irishman  delights  in  a  row ;  a  Chinese  in 
pageantry  and  ceremonies;  and  the  usually  apathetic 
Javan  gets  vociferously  enthusiastic  over  a  cock-fight. 
The  heaven  of  the  Hebrew  is  "  a  city  of  gold  and  precious 
stones,  with  a  supernatural  abundance  of  cforn  and  wine;" 
that  of  the  Turk — a  harem  peopled  by  houris  ;  that  of  the 
American  Indian — a  "  happy  hunting  ground ; "  in  the 
Norse  paradise  there  were  to  be  daily  battles  with  magi 
cal  healing  of  wounds  ;  whilst  the  Australian  hopes  that 
after  death  he  shall  "jump  up  a  white  fellow,  and  have 
plenty  of  sixpences."  Descending  to  individual  instances, 
we  find  Louis  XVI.  interpreting  "  greatest  happiness  "  to 
mean — making  locks  ;  instead  of  which  his  successor  read 
— making  empires.  It  was  seemingly  the  opinion  of 
Lycurgus  that  perfect  physical  development  was  the  chief 
essential  to  human  felicity;  Plotinus,  on  the  contrary, 
was  so  purely  ideal  in  his  aspirations  as  to  be  ashamed  of 
his  body.  Indeed  the  many  contradictory  answers  given 
by  Grecian  thinkers  to  the  question,  What  constitutes 
happiness  ?  have  given  occasion  to  comparisons  that  have 
now  become  trite,  Nor  has  greater  unanimity  been 
shown  amongst  ourselves.  To  a  miserly  Elwes  the  hoard 
ing  of  money  was  the  only  enjoyment  of  life ;  but  Day, 
the  philanthropic  author  of  "  Sandford  and  Merton," 
could  find  no  pleausurable  employment  save  in  its  distri 
bution.  Rural  quietude,  books,  and  a  friend,  are  the 
wants  of  the  poet ;  a  turf-hunter  longs  rather  for  a  large 
circle  of  titled  acquaintance,  a  box  at  the  Opera,  and  the 
freedom  of  Almack's.  The  ambitions  of  the  tradesman 


IN   WHAT    HAPPINESS    CONSISTS.  15 

and  the  artist  are  any  thing  but  alike ;  and  could  we  com 
pare  the  air  castles  of  the  ploughman  and  the  philosopher, 
we  should  find  them  of  widely-different  orders  of  archi 
tecture. 

Generalizing  such  facts,  we  see  that  the  standard  of 
"  greatest  happiness  "  possesses  as  little  fixity  as  the  other 
exponents  of  human  nature.  Between  nations  the  differ 
ences  of  opinion  are  conspicuous  enough.  On  contrasting ' 
the  Hebrew  patriarchs  with  their  existing  descendants, 
we  observe  that  even  in  the  same  race  the  beau  ideal  of 
existence  changes.  The  members  of  each  community 
disagree  upon  the  question.  Neither,  if  we  compare  the 
wishes  of  the  gluttonous  school-boy  with  those  of  the 
earth-scorning  transcendentalist  into  whom  he  may  after 
wards  grow,  do  we  find  any  constancy  in  the  individual. 
So  we  may  say,  not  only  that  every  epoch  and  every  — • 
people  has  its  peculiar  conceptions  of  happiness,  but  that  no 
two  men  have  like  conceptions ;  and  further,  that  in  each 
man  the  conception  is  not  the  same  at  any  two  periods 
of  life.  i 

The  rationale  of  this  is  simple  enough.  Happiness^ 
signifies  a  gratified  state  of  all  the  faculties.  The  gratifi 
cation  of  a  faculty  is  produced  by  its  exercise.  To  be 
agreeable  that  exercise  must  be  proportionate  to  the  power 
of  the  faculty  ;  if  it  is  insufficient  discontent  arises,  and  its 
excess  produces  weariness.  Hence,  to  have  complete 
felicity  is  to  have  all  the  faculties  exerted  in  the  ratio  of 
their  several  developments ;  and  an  ideal  arrangement  of 
circumstances  calculated  to  secure  this  constitutes  the 
standard  of  "  greatest  happiness  ;  "  but  the  minds  of  no 
two  individuals  contain  the  same  combination  of  elements. 
Duplicate  men  are  not  to  be  found.  There  is  in  each  a 
different  balance  of  desires.  Therefore  the  conditions 
adapted  for  the  highest  enjoyment  of  one,  would  not 
perfectly  compass  the  same  end  for  any  other.  And 


16  INTRODUCTION. 

consequently  the  notion  of  happiness  must  vary  with 
the  disposition  and  character ;  that  is,  must  vary  in 
definitely. 

Whereby  we  are  also  led  to  the  inevitable  conclusion 
"*that  a  true  conception  of  what  human  life  should  be,  is 
possible  only  to  the  ideal  man.  We  may  make  approxi 
mate  estimates,  but  he  only  in  whom  the  component  feel 
ings  exist  in  their  normal  proportions  is  capable  of  a  per 
fect  aspiration.  And  as  the  world  yet  contains  none  such, 
it  follows  that  a  specific  idea  of  "  greatest  happiness  "  is  for 
the  present  unattainable.  It  is  not,  then,  to  be  wondered 
—  at,  if  Paleys  and  Benthams  make  vain  attempts  at  a 
definition.  The  question  involves  one  of  those  mysteries 
which  men  are  ever  trying  to  penetrate  and  ever  failing. 
It  is  the  insoluble  riddle  which  Care,  Sphinx-like,  puts  to 
each  new  comer,  and  in  default  of  answer  devours  him. 
And  as  yet  there  is  no  QEdipus,  nor  any  sign  of  one. 

The  allegation  that  these  are  hypercritical  objections, 
and  that  for  all  practical  purposes  we  agree  sufiiciently 
well  as  to  w^hat  "greatest  happiness"  means,  will 
possibly  be  made  by  some.  It  were  easy  to  disprove 
this,  but  it  is  unnecessary,  for  there  are  plenty  of  ques 
tions  practical  enough  to  satisfy  such  cavillers,  and  about 
which  men  exhibit  none  of  this  pretended  unanimity. 
For  example : 

— What .  is  the  ratio  between  the  mental  and  bodily 
"^enjoyments  constituting  this  "greatest  happiness"? 
There  is  a  point  up  to  which  increase  of  mental  activity 
produces  increase  of  happiness ;  but  beyond  which,  it 
produces  in  the  end  more  pain  than  pleasure.  Where  is 
that  point  ?  Some  appear  to  think  that  intellectual 
culture  and  the  gratifications  deriveable  from  it  can 
hardly  be  carried  t)6o  far.  Others  again  maintain  that 
already  amongst  the  educated  classes  mental  excitements 
are  taken  in  excess ;  and  that  were  more  time  given  to 


PROBLEMS    TO   BE    SOLVED.  17 

a  proper  fulfilment  of  the  animal  functions,  a  larger 
amount  of  enjoyment  would  be  obtained.  If  "greatest 
happiness  "  is  to  be  the  rule,  it  becomes  needful  to  decide 
which  of  these  opinions  is  correct;  and  further  to 
determine  the  exact  boundary  between  the  use  and  abuse 
of  every  faculty. 

— Which  is  most  truly  an  element  in  the  desired 
felicity,  content  or  aspiration?  The  generality  assume, 
as  a  matter  of  course,  that  content  is.  They  think  it  the 
chief  essential  to  well-being.  There  are  others,  however, 
who  hold  that  but  for  discontent  we  should  have  been 
still  savages.  It  is  in  their  eyes  the  greatest  incentive 
to  progress.  Nay,  they  maintain  that  were  content 
the  order  of  the  day,  society  would  even  now  begin 
to  decay.  It  is  required  to  reconcile  these  contradictory 
theories. 

— And  this  synonyme  for  "  greatest  happiness  " — this 
"utility" — what  shall  be  comprised  under  it?  The 
million  would  confine  it  to  the  things  which  directly  or 
indirectly  minister  to  the  bodily  wants,  and  in  the  words 
of  the  adage  "  help  to  get  something  to  put  in  the  pot." 
Others  there  are  who  think  mental  improvement  useful  in 
itself,  irrespective  of  so-called  practical  results,  and  would 
therefore  teach  astronomy,  comparative  anatomy,  ethnol 
ogy,  and  the  like,  together  with  logic  and  metaphysics. 
Unlike  some  of  the  Roman  writers  who  held  the  practice 
of  the  fine  arts  to  be  absolutely  vicious,  there  are  now 
many  who  suppose  utility  to  comprehend  poetry,  painting, 
sculpture,  the  decorative  arts,  and  whatever  aids  the  re 
finement  of  the  taste.  Whilst  an  extreme  party  maintains 
that  music,  dancing,  the  drama,  and  what  are  commonly 
called  amusements,  are  equally  worthy  to  be  included. 
In  place  of  all  which  discordance  we  ought  to  have 
agreement. 

— Whether  shall  we  adopt  the  theory  of  some  that 


18  INTRODUCTION. 

^felicity  means  the  greatest  possible  enjoyment  of  this  life's 
pleasures  or  that  of  others,  that  it  consists  in  anticipating 
the  pleasures  of  a  life  to  come  ?  And  if  we  compromise 
the  matter,  and  say  it  should  combine  both,  how  much  of 
each  shall  go  to  its  composition  ? 

— Or  what  must  we  think  of  this  wealth-seeking  age 
of  ours  ?  Shall  we  consider  the  total  absorption  of  time 
and  energy  in  business — the  servitude  of  the  mind  to  the 
needs  of  the  body — the  spending  of  life  in  the  accumula 
tion  of  the  means  to  live,  .as  constituting  "  greatest  happi 
ness,"  and  act  accordingly  ?  Or  shall  we  legislate  upon 
the  assumption  that  this  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  voracity 
of  a  larva  assimilating  material  for  the  development  of 
the  future  psyche  ? 

Similar  unsettled  questions  might  be  indefinitely  multi 
plied.  Not  only  therefore  is  an  agreement  as  to  the 
meaning  of  "  greatest  happiness  "  theoretically  impossi 
ble,  but  it  is  also  manifest,  that  men  are  at  issue  upon  all 
topics,  which  for  their  determination  require  defined 
notions  of  it. 

"^  So  that  in  directing  us  to  this  "  greatest  happiness  to 
the  greatest  number,"  as  the  object  toward  which  we 
should  steer,  our  pilot  "  keeps  the  word  of  promise  to  our 
ear  and  breaks  it  to  our  hope."  What  he  shows  us 
through  his  telescope  is  a  fata  morgana,  and  not  the 
promised  land.  The  real  haven  of  our  hopes  dips  far 
down  below  the  horizon,  and  has  yet  been  seen  by  none. 
It  is  beyond  the  ken  of  seer,  be  he  ^ever  so  far-sighted. 

•*"  Faith  not  sight  must  be  our  guide.  We  cannot  do  with 
out  a  compass. 

§  3.  Even  were  the  fundamental  proposition  of  the 
expediency  system  not  thus  vitiated  by  the  indefiniteness 
of  its  terms,  it  would  still  be  vulnerable.  Granting  for 
the  sake  of  argument,  that  the  desideratum,  "greatest 


THE   SEARCH   FOE    "GREATEST   HAPPINESS."  19 

happiness,"  is  duly  comprehended,  its  identity  and  nature 
agreed  upon  by  all,  and  the  direction  in  which  it  lies 
satisfactorily  settled,  there  yet  remains  the  unwarranted 
assumption  that  it  is  possible  for  the  self-guided  human 
judgment  to  determine,  with  something  like  precision,  by  ) 
what  methods  it  may  be  achieved.  Experience  dailv^ 
proves  that  just  the  same  uncertainty  which  exists  re 
specting  the  specific  ends  to  be  obtained,  exists  likewise 
respecting  the  right  mode  of  attaining  them  when  sup 
posed  to  be  known.  In  their  attempts  to  compass  one 
after  another  the  several  items  which  go  to  make  up  the 
grand  total,  "greatest  happiness,"  men  have  been  any 
thing  but  successful ;  their  most  promising  measures  hav 
ing  commonly  turned  out  the  greatest  failures.  Let  us 
look  at  a  few  cases. 

When  it  was  enacted  in  Bavaria  that  no  marriage 
should  be  allowed  between  parties  without  capital,  unless 
certain  authorities  could  "  see  a  reasonable  prospect  of  the 
parties  being  able  to  provide  for  their  children,"  it  was 
doubtless  intended  to  advance  the  public  weal  by  checking 
improvident  unions,  and  redundant  population ;  a  purpose 
most  politicians  will  consider  praiseworthy,  and  a  provis 
ion  which  many  will  think  well  adapted  to  secure  it. 
Nevertheless  this  apparently  sagacious  measure  has  by  no 
means  answered  its  end;  the  fact  being  that  in  Mu 
nich,  the  capital  of  the  kingdom,  half  the  births  are 
illegitimate ! 

Those  too  were  admirable  motives,  and  very  cogent—* 
reasons,  which  led  our  government  to  establish  an  armed 
force  on  the  coast  of  Africa  for  the  suppression  of  the 
slave-trade.  What  could  be  more  essential  to  the  "great 
est  happiness "  than  the  annihilation  of  the  abominable 
traffic  ?  And  how  could  forty  ships  orVar,  supported  by 
an  expenditure  of  £700,000  a  year,  fail  to  wholly  or 
partially  accomplish  this  ?  The  results  have,  however, 


20  INTRODUCTION. 

been  any  thing  but  satisfactory.  When  the  abolitionists 
of  England  advocated  it,  they  little  thought  that  such  a 
measure  instead  of  preventing  would  only  "  aggravate  the 
horrors,  without  sensibly  mitigating  the  extent  of  the 
traffic ; "  that  it  would  generate  fast-sailing  slavers  with 
decks  one  foot  six  inches  apart,  suffocation  from  close 
packing,  miserable  diseases,  and  a  mortality  of  thirty-five 
per  cent.  They  dreamed  not  that  when  hard  pressed  a 
slaver  might  throw  a  whole  cargo  of  500  negroes  into  the 
sea  ;  nor  that  on  a  blockaded  coast  the  disappointed  chiefs 
would,  as  at  Gallinas,  put  to  death  200  men  and  women, 
and  stick  their  heads  on  poles,  along  shore,  in  sight 
of  the  squadron.*  In  short,  they  never  anticipated 
having  to  plead  as  they  now  do  for  the  abandonment  of 
coercion. 

—  Again,  how  great  and  how  self-evident  to  the  artisan 
mind,  were  the  promised  advantages  of  that  trades-union 
project,  whereby  master  manufacturers  were*  to  be  dis 
pensed  with  !  If  a  body  of  workmen  formed  themselves 
into  a  joint-stock  manufacturing  company,  with  elective 
directors,  secretary,  treasurer,  superintendents,  foremen, 
&c.,  for  managing  the  concern,  and  an  organization 
adapted  to  ensure  an  equitable  division  of  profits  amongst 
the  members,  it  was  clear  that  the  enormous  sums  pre 
viously  pocketed  by  the  employers,  would  be  shared 
amongst  the  employed,  to  the  great  increase  of  their 
prosperity.  Yet  all  past  attempts  to  act  out  this  very 
plausible  theory  have,  somehow  or  other,  ended  in  misera 
ble  failures. 

^  Another  illustration  is  afforded  by  the  fate  which  befell 
that  kindred  plan  recommended  by  Mr.  Babbage  in  his 
"  Economy  of  Manufactures,"  as  likely  to  be  to  the  benefit 
of  the  workmen  and  to  the  interest  of  the  master ;  that, 

*  See  Anti-Slavery's  Society's  Report  for  1847;  and  Evidence  before 
Parliamentary  Committee,  1848. 


FAILUEE   OF  RELIEF-MEASURES.  21 

namely,  in  which  factory  hands  were  to  "  unite  together, 
and  have  an  agent  to  purchase  by  wholesale  those  articles 
which  are  most  in  demand;  as  tea,  sugar,  bacon,  &c.,  and 
to  retail  them  at  prices  which  will  just  repay  the  whole 
sale  cost,  together  with  the  expenses  of  the  agent  who 
conducts  their  sale."  After  fourteen  years'  trial  a  concern, 
established  in  pursuance  of  this  idea,  was  "  abandoned 
with  the  joint  consent  of  all  parties ; "  Mr.  Babbage  con 
fessing  that  the  opinion  he  had  expressed  "  on  the  advan 
tage  of  such  societies  was  very  much  modified,"  and  illus 
trating  by  a  series  of  curves  "  the  quick  rise  and  gradual 
decline  "  of  the  experimental  association. 

The  Spitalfields  weavers  afford  us  another  case  in* 
point.  No  doubt  the  temptation  which  led  them  to  ob 
tain  the  Act  of  1773,  fixing  a  minimum  of  wages,  was  a 
stropg  one ;  and  the  anticipations  of  greater  comfort  to 
be  secured  by  its  enforcement  must  have  seemed  reasona 
ble  enough  .to  all.  Unfortunately,  however,  the  weavers 
did  not  consider  the  consequences  of  being  interdicted 
from  working  at  reduced  rates ;  and  little  expected  that 
before  1793,  some  4,000  looms  would  be  brought  to  a  stand 
in  consequence  of  the  trade  going  elsewhere. 

To  mitigate  distress  appearing  needful  for  the  produc 
tion  of  the  "  greatest  happiness,"  the  English  people  have 
sanctioned  upwards  of  one  hundred  acts  in  Parliament 
having  this  end  in  view,  each  of  them  arising  out  of  the 
failure  or  incompleteness  of  previous  legislation.  Men 
are  nevertheless  still  discontented  with  the  Poor  Laws,  - 
and  we  are  seemingly  as  far  as  ever  from  their  satisfac 
tory  settlement. 

But  why  cite  individual  cases  ?     Does  not  the  experi-  - 
ence  of  all  nations  testify  to  the  futility  of  these  empirical 
attempts  at  the  acquisition  of  happiness?     "What  is  the 
statute-bo"ok  but  a  record  of  such  unhappy  guesses  ?  or 
history  but  a  narrative  of  their  unsuccessful  issues  ?    And 


22  INTRODUCTION. 

what  forwarder  are  we  now  ?  Is  not  our  government  as 
busy  still  as  though  the  work  of  law-making  commenced 
but  yesterday?  Has  it  made  any  apparent  progress 
towards  a  final  settlement  of  social  arrangements  ?  Does 
it  not  rather  each  year  entangle  itself  still  further  in  the 
web  of  legislation,  confounding  the  already  heterogeneous 
mass  of  enactments  into  still  greater  confusion  ?  Nearly 
every  parliamentary  proceeding  is  a  tacit  confession  of  in- 
competency.  There  is  scarcely  a  bill  introduced  but  is  en 
titled  "  An  Act  to  amend  an  Act."  The  "  Whereas  "  of 
almost  every  preamble  heralds  an  account  of  the  miscar 
riage  of  previous  legislation.  Alteration,  explanation,  and 
repeal,  form  the  staple  employment  of  every  session.  All 
our  great  agitations  are  for  the  abolition  of  institutions  pur 
porting  to  be  for  the  public  good.  Witness  those  for  the 
removal  of  the  Test  and  Corporation  Acts,  for  Catholic 
Emancipation,  for  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws ;  to  which 
may  now  be  added,  that  for  the  separation  of  Church  and 
State.  The  history  of  one  scheme  is  the  history  of  all. 
First  comes  enactment,  then  probation,  then  failure ; 
next  an  amendment  and  another  failure ;  and,  after  many 
alternate  tinkerings  and  abortive  trials,  arrives  at  length 
repeal,  followed  by  the  substitution  of  some  fresh  plan, 
doomed  to  run  the  same  course,  and  share  a  like  fate. 

The  expediency-philosophy,  however,  ignores  this 
world  full  of  facts.  Though  men  have  so  constantly  been 
balked  in  their  attempts  to  secure,  by  legislation,  any  de 
sired  constituent  of  that  complex  whole,  "  greatest  happi 
ness,"  it  nevertheless  continues  to  place  confidence  in  the 
unaided  judgment  of  the  statesman.  It  asks  no  guide ;  it 
possesses  no  eclectic  principle ;  it  seeks  no  clue  whereby 
the  tangled  web  of  social  existence  may  be  unravelled  and 
its  laws  discovered.  But,  holding  up  to  view  the  great 
desideratum,  it  assumes  that  after  an  inspection  of  the 
aggregate  phenomena  of  national  life,  governments  are 


SUPERFICIAL  CONCEPTION  OF  THE  PROBLEM.     23 

qualified  to  concoct  such  measures  as  shall  be  "  expedient." 
It  considers  the  philosophy  of  humanity  so  easy,  the  con 
stitution  of  the  social  organism  so  simple,  the  causes  of  a 
people's  conduct  so  obvious,  that  a  general  examination 
can  give  to  "  collective  wisdom"  the  insight  requisite  for 
law-making.  It  thinks  that  man's  intellect  is  competent, 
first  to  observe  accurately  the  facts  exhibited  by  associ 
ated  human  nature  ;  to  form  just  estimates  of  general  and 
•individual  character,  of  the  effects  of  religions,  customs, 
superstitions,  prejudices,  of  the  mental  tendencies  of  the 
age,  of  the  probabilities  of  future  events,  &c.,  &c. ;  and 
then,  grasping  at  once  the  multiplied  phenomena  of  this 
ever-agitated,  ever-changing  sea  of  life,  to  derive  from 
them  that  knowledge  of  their  governing  principles  which 
shall  enable  him  to  say  whether  such  and  such  meas 
ures  will  conduce  to  "  the  greatest  happiness  of  the  great 
est  number." 

If  without  any  previous  investigation  of  the  properties 
of  terrestrial  matter,  Newton  had  proceeded  at  once  to 
study  the  dynamics  of  the  universe,  and  after  years  spent 
with  the  telescope  in  ascertaining  the  distances,  sizes, 
times  of  revolution,  inclinations  of  axes,  forms  of  orbits, 
perturbations,  &c.,  of  the  celestial  bodies,  had  set  himself 
to  tabulate  this  accumulated  mass  of  observations,  and  to 
educe  from  them  the  fundamental  laws  of  planetary  and 
stellar  equilibrium,  he  might  have  cogitated  to  all  eternity 
without  arriving  at  a  result. 

But  absurd  as  such  a  method  of  research  would  have 
been,  it  would  have  been  far  less  absurd  than  is  the  at 
tempt  to  find  out  the  principles  of  public  polity,  by  a  di 
rect  examination  of  that  wonderfully  intricate  combina 
tion — society.  It  need  excite  no  surprise  when  legisla 
tion,  based  upon  the  theories  thus  elaborated,  fails.  Rath 
er  would  its  success  afford  matter  for  extreme  astonish 
ment.  Considering  that  men  as  yet  so  imperfectly  under- 


24:  INTRODUCTION. 

stand  man — the  instrument  by  which,  and  the  material 
on  which,  laws  are  to  act — and  that  a  complete  knowl 
edge  of  the  unit — man,  is  but  a  first  step  to  the  compre 
hension  of  the  mass — society,  it  seems  obvious  enough  that 
to  educe  from  the  infinitely-ramified  complications  of  uni 
versal  humanity,  a  true  philosophy  of  national  life,  and  to 
found  thereon  a  code  of  rules  for  the  obtainrnent  of 
"  greatest  happiness,"  is  a  task  far  beyond  the  ability  of 
any  finite  mind. 

§  4.  Yet  another  fatal  objection  to  the  expediency- 
philosophy,  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact,  that  it  implies  the 
eternity  of  government.  It  is  a  mistake  to  assume  that 
government  must  necessarily  last  forever.  The  institu 
tion  marks  a  certain  stage  of  civilization — is  natural  to  a 
particular  phase  of  human  development.  It  is  not  essen 
tial  but  incidental.  As  amongst  the  Bushmen  we  find  a 

"*»»  state  antecedent  to  government ;  so  may  there  be  one  in 
which  it  shall  have  become  extinct.  Already  has  it  lost 
something  of  its  importance.  The  time  was  when  the 

^  history  of  a  people  was  but  the  history  of  its  government. 
It  is  otherwise  now.  The  once  universal  despotism  was 
but  a  manifestation  of  the  extreme  necessity  of  restraint. 

""Feudalism,  serfdom,  slavery — all  tyrannical  institutions, 
are  merely  the  most  vigorous  kinds  of  rule,  springing  out  of, 
and  necessary  to,  a  bad  state  of  man.  The  progress  from 

"-  these  is  in  all  cases  the  same — less  government.  Consti 
tutional  forms  mean  this.  Political  freedom  means  this. 
Democracy  means  this.  In  societies,  associations,  joint- 
stock  companies,  we  have  new  agencies  occupying  fields 
filled  in  less  advanced  times  and  countries  by  the  State. 
With  us  the  legislature  is  dwarfed  by  newer  and  greater 
powers — is  no  longer  master  but  slave.  "  Pressure  from 
without "  has  come  to  be  acknowledged  as  ultimate  ruler. 

"-The  triumph  of  the  Anti-Corn-law  League  is  simply  the 


TRANSITIONAL   NATUEE   OF   GOVERNMENT.  25 

most  marked  instance  yet,  of  the  new  style  of  govern 
ment — that  of  opinion,  overcoming  the  old  style — that  of 
force.  It  bids  fair  to  become  a  trite  remark  that  the  law 
maker  is  but  the  servant  of  the  thinker.  Daily  is  state 
craft  held  in  less  repute.  Even  the  Times  can  see  that 
"  the  social  changes  thickening  around  us  establish  a  truth 
sufficiently  humiliating  to  legislative  bodies,"  and  that 
"  the  great  stages  of  our  progress  are  determined  rather 
by  the  spontaneous  workings  of  society,  connected  as  they 
are  with  the  progress  of  art  and  science,  the  operations  of 
nature,  and  other  such  unpolitical  causes,  than  by  the 
proposition  of  a  bill,  the  passing  of  an  act,  or  any  other 
event  of  politics  or  of  state."  *  Thus,  as  civilization  ad 
vances,  does  government  decay.  To  the  bad  it  is  essen 
tial;  to  the  good,  not.  It  is  the  check  which  national 
wickedness  makes  to  itself,  and  exists  only  to  the  same 
degree.  Its  continuance  is  proof  of  still-existing  barbar 
ism.  What  a  cage  is  to  the  wild  beast,  law  is  to  the  sel 
fish  man.  Restraint  is  for  the  savage,  the  rapacious,  the  • 
violent ;  not  for  the  just,  the  gentle,  the  benevolent.  All 
necessity  for  external  force  implies  a  morbid  state.  Dun 
geons  for  the  felon ;  a  strait  jacket  for  the  maniac ;  crutches 
for  the  lame ;  stays  for  the  weak-backed ;  for  the  infirm 
of  purpose  a  master ;  for  the  foolish  a  guide ;  but  for  the 
sound  mind,  in  a  sound  body,  none  of  these.  Were  there 
no  thieves  and  murderers,  prisons  would  be  unnecessary. 
It  is  only  because  tyranny  is  yet  rife  in  the  world  that  we 
have  armies.  Barristers,  judges,  juries — all  the  instru 
ments  of  law — exist,  simply  because  knavery  exists.  Mag 
isterial  force  is  the  sequence  of  social  vice ;  and  the  police 
man  is  but  the  complement  of  the  criminal.  Therefore  it 
is  that  we  call  government  "  a  necessary  evil." 

What   then   must   be   thought   of  a   morality  which 

*  See  Times  of  October  12,  1846. 
2 


26  INTRODUCTION. 

chooses  this  probationary  institution  for  its  basis,  builds  a 
vast  fabric  of  conclusions  upon  its  assumed  permanence, 
selects  acts  of  parliament  for  its  materials,  and  employs 
the  statesman  for  its  architect  ?  The  expediency-philoso 
phy  does  this.  It  takes  government  into  partnership — 
assigns  to  it  entire  control  of  its  affairs — enjoins  all  to 
defer  to  its  judgment — makes  it,  in  short,  the  vital  princi 
ple,  the  very  soul  of  its  system.  When  Pa-ley  teaches 
'that  "  the  interest  of  the  whole  society  is  binding  upon 
every  part  of  it,"  he  implies  the  existence  of  some  su 
preme  power  by  which  that  "  interest  of  the  whole  so 
ciety"  is  to  be  determined.  And  elsewhere  he  more 
explicitly  tells  us,  that  for  the  attainment  of  a  national 
advantage  the  private  will  of  the  subject  is  to  give  way ; 
and  that  "  the  proof  of  this  advantage  lies  with  the  legis 
lature."  Still  more  decisive  is  Bentham,  when  he  says 
that  "  the  happiness  of  the  individuals  of  whom  a  commu 
nity  is  composed,  that  is,  their  pleasures  and  their  secur 
ity,  is  the  sole  end  which  the  legislator  ought  to  have  in 
view ;  the  sole  standard  in  conformity  with  which  each 
individual  ought,  as  far  as  depends  upon  the  legislature, 
to  be  made  to  fashion  his  behaviour."  These  positions,  be 
it  remembered,  are  not  voluntarily  assumed ;  they  are  ne 
cessitated  by  the  premises.  If,  as  its  propounder  tells  us, 
"  expediency  "  means  the  benefit  of  the  mass,  not  of  the 
individual — of  the  future  as  much  as  of  the  present,  it 
presupposes  some  one  to  judge  of  what  will  most  conduce 
to  that  benefit.  Upon  the  "  utility  "  of  this  or  that  meas 
ure,  the  views  are  so  various  as  to  render  an  umpire  essen 
tial.  Whether  protective  duties,  or  established  religions, 
or  capital  punishments,  or  poor  laws,  do  or  do  not  minis 
ter  to  the  "  general  good,"  are  questions  concerning  which 
there  is  such  difference  of  opinion,  that  were  nothing  to 
be  done  till  all  agreed  upon  them,  we  might  stand  still 
to  the  end  of  time.  If  each  man  carried  out,  independ- 


FUTILITY   OF   THE   EXPEDIENCY-PHILOSOPHY.  27 

ently  of  a  state  power,  his  own  notions  of  what  would 
best  secure  "  the  greatest  happiness  of  the  greatest  num 
ber,"  society  would  quickly  lapse  into  confusion.  Clearly, 
therefore,  a  morality  established  upon  a  maxim  of  which 
the  practical  interpretation  is  questionable,  involves  the 
existence  of  some  authority  whose  decision  respecting  it 
shall  be  final — that  is,  a  legislature.  And  without  that 
authority,  such  a  morality  must  ever  remain  inoperative. 

See  here,  then,  the  predicament.  A  system  of  moral 
philosophy  professes  to  be  a  code  of  correct  rules  for  the 
control  of  human  beings — fitted  for  the  regulation  of  the 
best,  as  well  as  the  worst  members  of  the  race — applica 
ble,  if  true,  to  the  guidance  of  humanity  in  its  highest 
conceivable  perfection.  Government,  however,  is  an  insti 
tution  originating  in  man's  imperfection ;  an  institution 
confessedly  begotten  by  necessity  out  of  evil ;  one  which 
might  be  dispensed  with  were  the  world  peopled  with  the 
unselfish,  the  conscientious,  the  philanthropic ;  one,  in 
short,  inconsistent  with  this  same  "  highest  conceivable 
perfection."  How,  then,  can  that  be  a  true  system  of  mo 
rality  which  adopts  government  as  one  of  its  premises  ? 

§  5.  Of  the  expediency-philosophy  it  must  therefore 
be  said,  in  the  first  place;~ihat  it  can  make  no  claim  to  a 
scientific  character,  seeing  that  its  fundamental  proposi 
tion  is  not  an  axiom,  but  simply  an  enunciation  of  the 
problem  to  be  solved. 

(^Further,  that  even  supposing  its  fundamental  proposi 
tion  were  an  axiom,  it  would  still  be  inadmissible,  because 
expressed  in  terms  possessing  no  fixed  acceptation. 

Moreover,  were  the  expediency  theory  otherwise  satis 
factory,  it  would  be  still  useless ;  since  it  requires  nothing 
less  than  omniscience  to  carry  it  into  practice. 

|  And,  waiving  all  other  objections,  we  are  yet  compelled 
to  reject  a  system,  which,  at  the  same  time  that  it  tacitly 
lays  claim  to  perfection,  takes  imperfection  for  its  basis. 


•*jk 
fv+^J^sj) 

28  ',  INTRODUCTION. 


THE  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  MORAL  SENSE. 

§  1.  There  is  no  way  of  coming  at  a  true  theory  of 
society,  but  by  inquiring  into  the  nature  of  its  component 
individuals.  To  understand  humanity  in  its  combinations, 
it  is  necessary  to  analyze  that  humanity  in  its .  elementary 
form — for  the  explanation  of  the  compound,  to  refer  back 
to  the  simple.  We  quickly  find  that  every  phenomenon 
exhibited  by  an  aggregation  of  men,  originates  in  some 
quality  of  man  himself.  A  little  consideration  shows  us, 
for  instance,  that  the  very  existence  of  society,  implies 
some  natural  affinity  in  its  members  for  such  a  union.  It 
is  pretty  clear  too,  that  without  a  certain  fitness  in  man 
kind  for  ruling,  and  being  ruled,  government  would  be  an 
impossibility.  The  infinitely  complex  organizations  of 
commerce,  have  grown  up  under  the  stimulus  of  certain 
desires  existing  in  each  of  us.  And  it  is  from  our  pos 
session  of  a  sentiment  to  which  they  appeal,  that  religious 
institutions  have  been  called  into  existence. 

In  fact,  on  looking  closely  into  the  matter,  we  find  that 
no  other  arrangement  is  conceivable.  The  characteristics 
exhibited  by  beings  in  an  associated  state  cannot  arise 
from  the  accident  of  combination,  but  must  be  the  conse 
quences  of  certain  inherent  properties  of  the  beings  them 
selves.  True,  the  gathering  together  may  call  out  these 
characteristics;  it  may  make  manifest  what  was  before 
dormant ;  it  may  afford  the  opportunity  for  undeveloped 
peculiarities  to  appear ;  but  it  evidently  does  not  create 
them.  No  phenomenon  can  be  presented  by  a  corporate 
body,  but  what  there  is  a  preexisting  capacity  in  its  indi 
vidual  members  for  producing. 

This  fact,  that  the  properties  of  a  mass  are  dependent 
upon  the  attributes  of  its  component  parts,  we  see  through- 


WE  MUST  BEGIN   WITH   THE  INDIVIDUAL.  29 

out  nature.  In  the  chemical  combination  of  one  element  " 
with  another,  Dalton  has  shown  us  that  the  affinity  is  be 
tween  atom  and  atom.  What  we  call  the  weight  of  a 
body,  is  the  sum  of  the  gravitative  tendencies  of  its  sepa 
rate  particles.  The  strength  of  a  bar  of  metal,  is  the  total 
effect  of  an  indefinite  number  of  molecular  adhesions. 
And  the  power  of  the  magnet,  is  a  cumulative  result  of 
the  polarity  of  its  independent  corpuscles.  After  the  - 
same  manner,  every  social  phenomenon  must  have  its  ori 
gin  in  some  property  of  the  individual.  And  just  as  the 
attractions  and  affinities  which  are  latent  in  separate  at 
oms,  become  visible  when  those  atoms  are  approximated ; 
so  the  forces  that  are  dormant  in  the  isolated  man,  are 
rendered  active  by  juxtaposition  with  his  fellows. 

This  consideration,  though  perhaps  needlessly  elabo 
rated,  has  an  important  bearing  on  our  subject.  It  points 
out  the  path  we  must  pursue  in  our  search  after  a  true  so 
cial  philosophy.  It  suggests  the  idea  that  the  moral  law— • 
of  society,  like  its  other  laws,  originates  in  some  attribute 
of  the  human  being.  It  warns  us  against  adopting  any*-— • 
fundamental  doctrine  which,  like  that  of  "  the  greatest 
happiness  to  the  greatest  number,"  cannot  be  expressed 
without  presupposing  a  state  of  aggregation.  On  the 
other  hand  it  hints  that  the  first  principle  of  a  code  for  the 
right  ruling  of  humanity  in  its  state  of  multitude,  is  to  be 
found  in  humanity  in  its  state  of  unitude — that  the  moral 
forces  upon  which  social  equilibrium  depends,  are  resident 
in  the  social  atom — man ;  and  that  if  we  would  under 
stand  the  nature  of  those  forces,  and  the  laws  of  that 
equilibrium,  we  must  look  for  them 'in  the  human  consti 
tution. 

§  2.  Had  we  no  other  inducement  to  eat  than  that 
arising  from  the  prospect  of  certain  advantages  to  be 
thereby  obtained,  it  is  scarcely  probable  that  our  bodies 


30  INTRODUCTION. 

would  be  so  well  cared  for  as  now.  One  can  quite  imag 
ine,  that  were  we  deprived  of  that  punctual  monitor — ap 
petite,  and  left  to  the  guidance  of  some  reasoned  code  of 
rules,  such  rules,  were  they  never  so  philosophical,  and 
the  benefits  of  obeying  them  never  so  obvious,  would  form 
but  a  very  inefficient  substitute.  Or,  instead  of  that  pow 
erful  affection  by  which  men  are  led  to  nourish  and  pro 
tect  their  offspring,  did  there  exist  merely  an  abstract 
opinion  that  it  was  proper  or  necessary  to  maintain  the 
population  of  the  globe,  it  is  questionable  Avhether  the 
annoyance,  anxiety,  and  expense,  of  providing  for  a  pos 
terity,  would  not  so  far  exceed  the  anticipated  good,  as  to 
involve  a  rapid  extinction  of  the  species.  And  if,  in  ad 
dition  to  these  needs  of  the  body,  and  of  the  race,  all 
other  requirements  of  our  nature  were  similarly  consigned 
to  the  sole  care  of  the  intellect — were  knowledge,  prop 
erty,  freedom,  reputation,  friends,  sought  only  at  its  dic 
tation — then  would  our  investigations  be  so  perpetual,  our 
estimates  so  complex,  our  decisions  so  difficult,  that  life 
would  be  wholly  occupied  in  the  collection  of  evidence, 
and  the  balancing  of  probabilities.  Under  such  an  ar 
rangement  the  utilitarian  philosophy  would  indeed  have 
strong  argument  in  nature ;  for  it  would  be  simply  apply 
ing  to  society,  that  system  of  governance  by  appeal  to  cal 
culated  final  results,  which  already  ruled  the  individual. 
—  Quite  different,  however,  is  the  method  of  nature.  An 
swering  to  each  of  the  actions  which  it  is  requisite  for  us 
to  perform,  we  find  in  ourselves  some  prompter  called  a 
desire ;  and  the  more  essential  the  action,  the  more  pow 
erful  is  the  impulse  to  its  performance,  and  the  more  in 
tense  the  gratification  derived  therefrom.  Thus,  the  long 
ings  for  food,  for  sleep,  for  warmth,  are  irresistible ;  and 
quite  independent  of  foreseen  advantages.  The  continu 
ance  of  the  race  is  secured  by  others  equally  strong, 
whose  dictates  are  followed,  not  in  obedience  to  reason, 


PAET  PLAYED  BY  THE  DESIRES.          31 

but  often  in  defiance  of  it.  That  men  are  not  impelled  to 
accumulate  the  means  of  subsistence  solely  by  a  view  to 
consequences,  is  proved  by  the  existence  of  misers,  in 
whom  the  love  of  acquirement  is  gratified  to  the  neglect 
of  the  ends  meant  to  be  subserved.  We  find  employed  a 
like  system  of  regulating  our  conduct  to  our  fellows.  That 
we  may  behave  in  the  public  sight  in  the  most  agreeable 
manner,  we  possess  a  love  of  praise.  It  is  desirable  that 
there  should  be  a  segregation  of  those  best  fitted  for  each 
other's  society — hence  the  sentiment  of  friendship.  And 
in  the  reverence  felt  by  men  for  superiority,  we  see  a  pro 
vision  intended  to  secure  the  supremacy  of  the  best. 

May  we  not  then  reasonably  expect  to  find  a  like  in-— • 
strumentality  employed  in  impelling  us  to  that  line  of  con 
duct,  in  the  due  observance  of  which  consists  what  we 
call  morality  ?  All  must  admit  that  we  are  guided  to  our 
bodily  welfare  by  instincts ;  that  from  instincts,  also,  spring 
those  domestic  relationships  by  which  other  important 
objects  are  compassed — and  that  similar  agencies  are  in 
many  cases  used  to  secure  our  indirect  benefit,  by  regulat 
ing  social  behaviour.  Seeing,  therefore,  that  whenever 
we  can  readily  trace  our  actions  to  their  origin,  we  find 
them  produced  after  this  manner,  it  is,  to  say  the  least  of 
it,  highly  probable  that  the  same  mental  mechanism  is 
employed  in  all  cases — that  as  the  all-important  require 
ments  of  our  being  are  fulfilled  at  the  solicitations  of  de 
sire,  so  also  are  the  less  essential  ones — that  upright  con 
duct  in  each  being  necessary  to  the  happiness  of  all,  there 
exists  in  us  an  impulse  toward,  such  conduct ;  or,  in  other 
words,  that  we  possess  a  "  Moral  Sense,"  the  duty  of  which 
is  to  dictate  rectitude  in  our  transactions  with  each  other; 
which  receives  gratification  from  honest  and  fair  dealing ; 
and  which  gives  birth  to  the  sentiment  of  justice.  *""""' 

In  bar  of  this  conclusion  it  is  indeed  urged,  that  did 
there  exist  such  an  agency  for  controlling  the  behaviour 


32  INTRODUCTION. 

of  man  to  man,  we  should  see  universal  evidence  of  its 
influence.  Men  would  exhibit  a  more  manifest  obedience 
to  its  supposed  dictates  than  they  do.  There  would  be  a 
greater  uniformity  of  opinion  as  to  the  lightness  or  wrong- 
ness  of  actions.  And  we  should  not,  as  now,  find  one 
man,  or  nation,  considering  as  a  virtue,  what  ano'ther  re 
gards  as  a  vice — Malays  glorying  in  the  piracy  abhorred 
by  civilized  races — a  Thug  regarding  as  a  religious  act, 
that  assassination  at  which  a  European  shudders — a  Rus 
sian  piquing  himself  on  his  successful  trickery — a  red  In 
dian  in  his  undying  revenge — things  which  with  us  would 
hardly  be  boasted  of. 

Overwhelming  as  this  objection  appears,  its  fallacy  be 
comes  conspicuous  enough,  if  we  observe  the  predicament 
into  which  the  general  application  of  such  a  test  betrays 
us.  As  thus :  None  deny  the  universal  existence  of  that 
instinct  already  adverted  to,  which  urges  us  to  take  the 
food  needful  to  support  life ;  and  none  deny  that  such  in. 
stinct  is  highly  beneficial,  and  in  all  likelihood  essential  to 
being.  Nevertheless  there  are  not  wanting  infinite  evils 
and  incongruities,  arising  out  of  its  rule.  All  know  that 
appetite  does  not  invariably  guide  men  aright  in  the  choice 
of  food,  either  as  to  quality  or  quantity.  Neither  can  any 
maintain  that  its  dictates  are  uniform,  when  reminded 
of  those  unnumbered  differences  in  the  opinions  called 
"  tastes "  which  it  originates  in  each.  The  mere  mention 
of  "  gluttony,"  "  drunkenness,"  reminds  us  that  the  prompt 
ings  of  appetite  are  not  always  good.  Carbuncled  noses, 
cadaverous  faces,  foetid  breaths,  and  plethoric  bodies,  meet 
us  at  every  turn;  and  our  condolences  are  perpetually 
asked  for  headaches,  flatulence,  nightmare,  heartburn,  and 
endless  other  dyspeptic  symptoms.  Again :  equally  great 
irregularities  may  be  found  in  the  workings  of  that  gener 
ally  recognized  feeling — parental  affection.  Amongst  our 
selves,  its  beneficial  sway  seems  tolerably  uniform.  In 


THE   EXISTENCE   OF   A   MOEAL   SENSE   ASSUMED.         33 

the  East,  however,  infanticide  is  practised  now  as  it  ever 
has  been.  During  the  so-called  classic  times,  it  was  -com 
mon  to  expose  babes  to  the  tender  mercies  of  wild  beasts. 
And  it  was  the  Spartan  practice  to  cast  all  the  newly-born 
who  were  not  approved  by  a  committee  of  old  men,  into 
a  public  pit  provided  for  the  purpose.  If,  then,  it  be  ar 
gued  that  the  want  of  uniformity  in  men's  moral  codes, 
together  with  the  weakness  and  partiality  of  their  influ 
ence,  prove  the  nonexistence  of  a  feeling  designed  for  the 
right  regulation  of  our  dealings  with  each  other,  it  must 
be  inferred  from  analogous  irregularities  in  men's  conduct 
as  to  food  and  offspring,  that  there  are  no  such  feelings  as 
appetite  and  parental  affection.  As,  however,  we  do  not 
draw  this  inference  in  the  one  case,  we  cannot  do  so  in  the 
other.  Hence,  notwithstanding  all  the  incongruities,  we 
must  admit  the  existence  of  a  Moral  Sense  to  be  both  pos 
sible  and  probable. 

§  3.  But  that  we  possess  such  a  sense,  may  be  best 
proved  by  evidence  drawn  from  the  lips  of  those  who  as 
sert  that  we  have  it  not.  Oddly  enough  Bentham  unwit 
tingly  derives  his  initial  proposition  from  an  oracle  whose 
existence  he  denies,  and  at  which  he  sneers  when  it  is  ap 
pealed  to  by  others.  "  One  man,"  he  remarks,  speaking 
of  Shaftesbury,  "  says  he  has  a  thing  made  on  purpose  to 
tell  him  what  is  right  and  what  is  wrong ;  and  that  it 
is  called  moral  sense:  and  then  he  goes  to  work  at  his 
ease,  and  says  such  and  such  a  thing  is  right,  and  such 
and  such  a  thing  is  wrong.  -Why?  'because  my  moral 
sense  tells  me  it  is.' "  Now  that  Bentham  should  have 
no  other  authority  for  his  own  maxim  than  this  same 
moral  sense,  is  somewhat  unfortunate  for  him.  Yet,  on 
putting  that  maxim  into  critical  hands,  we  shall  soon  dis 
cover  such  to  be  the  fact.  Let  us  do  this. 

"  And  so  you  think,"  says  the  patrician,  "  that  the  ob- 
2* 


34  INTKODUCTION. 

ject  of  our  rule  should  be  l  the  greatest  happiness  to  the 
greatest  number.' " 

"  Such  is  our  opinion,"  answers  the  petitioning  ple 
beian. 

"  Well  now,  let  us  see  what  your  principle  involves. 
Suppose  men  to  be,  as  they  very  commonly  are,  at  var 
riance  in  their  desires  on  some  given  point ;  and  suppose 
that  those  forming  the  larger  party  will  receive  a  certain 
amount  of  happiness  each,  from  the  adoption  of  one  course, 
whilst  those  forming  the  smaller  party  will  receive  the 
same  amount  of  happiness  each,  from  the  adoption  of  the 
opposite  course :  then  if  '  greatest  happiness '  is  to  be  our 
guide,  it  must  follow,  must  it  not,  that  the  larger  party 
ought  to  have  their  way  ?  " 

"  Certainly." 

"  That  is  to  say  if  you — the  people,  are  a  hundred, 
whilst  we  are  ninety-nine,  your  happiness  must  be  pre 
ferred,  should  our  wishes  clash,  and  should  the  individual 
amounts  of  gratification  at  stake  on  the  two  sides  be  equal." 

"  Exactly ;  our  axiom  involves  that." 

"  So  then  it  seems,  that  as,  in  such  a  case,  you  decide 
between  the  two  parties  by  numerical  majority,  you  as 
sume  that  the  happiness  of  a  member  of  the  one  party,  is 
equally  important  with  that  of  a  member  of  the  other." 

"  Of  course." 

"  Wherefore,  if  reduced  to  its  simplest  form,  your  doc 
trine  turns  out  to  be  the  assertion,  that  all  men  have  equal 
claims  to  happiness ;  or,  applying  it  personally — that  you 
have  as  good  a  right  to  happiness  as  I  have." 

"No  doubt  I  have." 

"  And  pray,  sir,  who  told  you  that  you  have  as  good  a 
right  to  happiness  as  I  have  ?  " 

"  Who  told  me  ? — I  am  sure  of  it ;  1  know  it ;  I  feel 
it;I-" 

"  Nay,  nay,  that  will  not  do.     Give  me  your  authority. 


WOEKINGS   OF   THE   MOEAL   SENTIMENTS.  35 

Tell  me  who  told  you  this — how  you  got  at  it — whence 
you  derived  it." 

"Whereupon,  after  some  shuffling,  our  petitioner  is 
forced  to  confess,  that  he  has  no  other  authority  but  his 
own  feeling — that  he  has  simply  an  innate  perception  of 
the  fact ;  or,  in  other  words,  that  "  his  moral  sense  tells 
him  so." 

Whether  it  rightly  tells  him  so,  need  not  now  be  con 
sidered.  All  that  demands  present  notice  is  the  fact,  that 
when  cross-examined,  even  the  disciples  of  Bentham  have 
no  alternative  but  to  fall  back  upon  an  intuition  of  this 
much  derided  moral  sense,  for  the  foundation  of  their  own 
system. 

§  4.  In  truth,  none  but  those  committed  to  a  precon 
ceived  theory,  can  fail  to  recognize,  on  every  hand,  the 
workings  of  such  a  faculty.  From  early  times  downward 
there  have  been  constant  signs  of  its  presence — signs 
which  happily  thicken  as  our  own  day  is  approached. 
The  articles  of  Magna  Charta  embody  its  protests  against 
oppression,  and  its  demands  for  a  better  administration  of 
justice.  Serfdom  was  abolished  partly  at  its  suggestion. 
It  encouraged  Wickliffe,  Huss,  Luther,  and  Knox,  in  their 
contests  with  Popery ;  and  by  it  were  Huguenots,  Cove 
nanters,  Moravians,  stimulated  to  maintain  freedom  of 
judgment  in  the  teeth  of  armed  Ecclesiasticism.  It  dic 
tated  Milton's  "  Essay  on  the  Liberty  of  Unlicensed  Print 
ing."  It  piloted  the  pilgrim  fathers  to  the  new  world. 
It  supported  the  followers  of  George  Fox  under  tines  and 
imprisonment.  And  it  whispered  resistance  to  the  Pres 
byterian  clergy  of  1662.  In  latter  days  it  emitted  that 
tide  of  feeling  which  undermined  and  swept  away  Catho 
lic  disabilities.  Through  the  mouths  of  anti-slavery  ora 
tors,  it  poured  out  its  fire,  to  the  scorching  of  the  selfish, 
to  the  melting  of  the  good,  to  our  national  purification. 


36  INTEODUCTTON. 

It  was  its  heat,  too,  which  warmed  our  sympathy  for  the 
Poles,  and  made  boil  our  indignation  against  their  op 
pressor.  Pent-up  accumulations  of  it,  let  loose  upon  a 
long-standing  injustice,  generated  the  effervescence  of  a 
reform  agitation.  Out  of  its  growing  flame  came  those 
sparks  by  which  Protectionist  theories  were  exploded,  and 
S*.that  light  which  discovered  to  us  the  truths  of  Free-trade. 
By  the  passage  of  its  subtle  current  is  that  social  electrol 
ysis  effected,  which  classes  men  into  parties — which  sepa 
rates  the  nation  into  its  positive  and  negative — its  radical 
and  conservative  elements.  At  present  it  puts  on  the 
garb  of  Anti-State-Church  Associations,  and  shows  its 
presence  in  manifold  societies  for  the  extension  of  popular 
power.  It  builds  monuments  to  political  martyrs,  agitates 
for  the  admission  of  Jews  into  Parliament,  publishes  books 
on  the  rights  of  women,  petitions  against  class-legislation, 
threatens  to  rebel  against  militia  conscriptions,  refuses  to 
pay  church-rates,  repeals  oppressive  debtor-acts,  laments 
over  the  distresses  of  Italy,  and  thrills  with  sympathy  for 
the  Hungarians.  From  it,  as  from  a  root,  spring  our  aspi 
rations  after  social  rectitude  :  it  blossoms  in  such  express 
ions  as — "  Do  as  you  would  be  done  by,"  "  Honesty  is  the 
best  policy,"  "  Justice  before  Generosity,"  and  its  fruits 
are  Equity,  Freedom,  Safety. 

§  5.  But  how,  it  may  be  asked,  can  a  sentiment  have 
a  perception  ?  how  can  a  desire  give  rise  to  a  moral  sense  ? 
Is  there  not  here  a  confounding  of  the  intellectual  with 
the  emotional  ?  It  is  the  office  of  a  sense  to  perceive,  not 
to  induce  a  certain  kind  of  action ;  whilst  it  is  the  office 
of  an  instinct  to  induce  a  certain  kind  of  action,  and  not 
to  perceive.  But  in  the  foregoing  arguments,  motor  and 
percipient  functions  are  attributed  to  the  same  agent. 

The  objection  seems  a  serious  one;  and  were  the  term 
sense  to  be  understood  in  its  strictest  acceptation,  would 


HOW   THE   TEEM    "  SENSE  "    IS   USED.  37 

be  fatal.  But  the  word  is  in  this  case,  as  in  many  others, 
used  to  express  that  feeling  with  which  an  instinct  comes 
to  regard  the  deeds  and  objects  it  is  related  to ;  or  rather 
that  judgment  which,  by  a  kind  of  reflex  action,  it  causes 
the  intellect  to  form  of  them.  To  elucidate  this  we  must 
take  an  example ;  and  perhaps  the  love  of  accumulation 
will  afford  us  as  good  a  one  as  any. 

We  find,  then,  that  conjoined  with  the  impulse  to  ac 
quire  property,  there  is  what  we  'call  a  sense  of  the  value 
of  property ;  and  we  find  the  vividness  of  this  sense  to 
vary  with  the  strength  of  the  impulse.  Contrast  the  mi 
ser  and  the  spendthrift.  Accompanying  his  constant  de 
sire  to  heap  up,  the  miser  has  a  quite  peculiar  belief  in  the 
worth  of  money.  The  most  stringent  economy  he  thinks 
virtuous /  and  anything  like  the  most  ordinary  liberality 
viciou$  y  whilst  of  extravagance  he  has  an  absolute  horror. 
Whatever  adds  to  his  store  seems  to  him  good:  what 
ever  takes  from  it,  bad.  And  should  a  passing  gleam  of 
generosity  lead  him  on  some  special  occasion  to  open  his 
purse,  he  is  pretty  sure  afterwards  to  reproach  himself 
with  having  done  wrong.  On  the  other  hand,  whilst  the 
spendthrift  is  deficient  in  the  instinct  of  acquisition,  he 
also  fails  to  realize  the  intrinsic  worth  of  property;  it 
does  not  come  home  to  him ;  he  has  little  sense  of  it. 
Hence  under  the  influence  of  other  feelings,  he  regards 
saving  habits  as  mean;  and  holds  that  there  is  some 
thing  noble  in  profuseness.  Now  it  is  clear  that  these 
opposite  perceptions  of  the  propriety  or  impropriety  of 
certain  lines  of  conduct,  do  not  originate  with  the  intellect, 
but  with  the  emotional  faculties.  The  intellect,  uninflu 
enced  by  desire,  would  show  both  miser  and  spendthrift 
that  their  habits  were  unwise ;  whereas  the  intellect,  in 
fluenced  by  desire,  makes  each  think  the  other  a  fool,  but 
does  not  enable  him  to  see  his  own  foolishness. 

Now  this  law  is  at  work  universally.     Every  feeling  is 


00  INTRODUCTION. 

accompanied  by  a  sense  of  the  Tightness  of  those  actions 
which  give  it  gratification — tends  to  generate  convictions 
that  things  are  good  or  bad,  according  as  they  bring  tg  it 
pleasure  or  pain ;  and  would  always  generate  such  convic 
tions,  were  it  unopposed.  As  however  there  is  a  perpet 
ual  conflict  amongst  the  feelings — some  of  them  being  in 
antagonism  throughout  life — there  results  a  proportionate 
incongruity  in  the  beliefs — a  similar  conflict  amongst 
these  also — a  parallel  antagonism.  So  that  it  is  only 
where  a  desire  is  very  predominant,  or  where  no  adverse 
desire  exists,  that  this  connection  between  the  in 
stincts  and  the  opinions  they  dictate,  becomes  distinctly 
visible. 

--—Applied  to  the  elucidation  of  the  case  in  hand,  these 
facts  explain  how  from  an  impulse  to  behave  in  the  way 
we  call  equitable,  there  will  arise  a  perception  thajb  such 
behaviour  is  proper — a  conviction  that  it  is  good.  This 
instinct  or  sentiment,  being  gratified  by  a  just  action,  and 
distressed  by  an  unjust  action,  produces  in  us  an  approba 
tion  of  the  one,  and  a  disgust  toward  the  other;  and 
these  readily  beget  beliefs  that  the  one  is  virtuous,  and 
the  other  vicious.  Or,  referring  again  to  the  illustration, 
we  may  say  that  as  the  desire  to  accumulate  property  is 
accompanied  by  a  sense  of  the  value  of  property,  so  is  the 
desire  to  act  fairly,  accompanied  by  a  sense  of  what  is  fair. 
And  thus,  limiting  the  word  sense  to  the  expression  of 
this  fact,  there  is  nothing  wrong  in  attributing  motor  and 
percipient  functions  to  the  same  agent. 

It  will  perhaps  be  needful  here  to  meet  the  objection, 
that  whereas  according  to  the  foregoing  statement  each 
feeling  tends  to  generate  notions  'of  the  Tightness  or 
wrongness  of  the  actions  toward  which  it  is  related ;  and 
whereas  morality  should  determine  what  is  correct  in  all 
departments  of  conduct,  it  is  improper  to  confine  the  term 
"  moral  sense  "  to  that  which  can  afford  directions  in  only 


TRUE  BASIS  OF  THE  MORAL  CODE.          39 

one  department.  This  is  quite  true.  Nevertheless,  see 
ing  that  our  behaviour  toward  each  other  is  the  most  im 
portant  part  of  our  behaviour,  and  that  in  which  we  are 
most  prone  to  err ;  seeing  also  that  this  same  faculty  is  so 
purely  and  immediately  moral  in  its  purpose ;  and  seeing 
further,  as  we  shall  shortly  do,  that  its  dictates  are  the 
only  ones  capable  of  reduction  to  an  exact  form,  we  may 
with  some  sh*ow  of  reason  continue  to  employ  that  term, 
with  this  restricted  meaning. 

§  6.  Assuming  the  existence  in  man  of  such  a  faculty 
as  this  for  prompting  him  to  right  dealings  with  his  fel 
lows,  and  assuming  that  it  generates  certain  intuitions  * 
respecting  those  dealings,  it  seems  reasonable  enough  to 
seek  in  such  intuitions  the  elements  of  a  moral  code.  At 
tempts  to  construct  a  code  so  founded  have  from  time  to 
time  been  made.  They  have  resulted  in  systems  based 
by  Shaftesbury  and  Hutchinson  on  "  Moral  Sense,"  by 
Reid  and  Beattie  on  "  Common  Sense,"  by  Price  on 
"  Understanding,"  by  Clarke  on  "  Fitness  of  Things,"  by 
Granville  Sharpe  on  "Natural  Equity,"  by  others  on 
"Rule  of  Right,"  "Natural  Justice,"  "Law  of  Nature," 
"Law  of  Reason,"  "Right  Reason,"  &c.  Unsuccessful  as 
these  writers  have  been  in  the  endeavour  to  develop  a 
philosophical  morality,  all  of  them,  if  the  foregoing  rea 
soning  be  correct,  have  consulted  a  true  oracle.  Though 
they  have  failed  to  systematize  its  utterances,  they  have 
acted  wisely  in  trying  to  do  this.  An  analysis  of  right 
and  wrong  so  made,  is  not  indeed  the  profoundest  and  ulti 
mate  one ;  but,  as  we  shall  by-and-by  see,  it  is  perfectly 
in  harmony  with  that  in  its  initial  principle,  and  coinci 
dent  with  it  in  its  results. 

Against  codes  thus  derived,  it  is  indeed  alleged,  that 

*  As  here  used,  this  word  is  of  course  to  be  understood  in  a  popular, 
and  not  in  a  metaphysical  sense. 


40  INTRODUCTION 

they  are  necessarily  worthless  because  unstable  in  their 
premises.  "  If£  say  the  objectors,  "  this  c  moral  sense,'  to 
which  all  these  writers  directly  or  indirectly  appeal, 
possesses  no  fixity,  gives  no  uniform  response,  says  one 
thing  in  Europe,  and  another  in  Asia — originates  different 
notions  of  duty  in  each  age,  each  race,  each  individ 
ual,  how  can  it  afford  a  safe  foundation  for  a  systematic 
morality?  What  can  be  more  absurd  than  to  seek  a 
"definite  rule  of  right,  in  the  answers  of  so  uncertain  an 
authority  ?  " 

Even  granting  that  there  is  no  escape  from  this  diffi 
culty — even  supposing  no  method  to  exist,  by  which  from 
this  source,  a  moral  philosophy  can  be  drawn  free  from  so 
fatal  an  imperfection,  there  still  results  merely  that  same 
dilemma,  in  which  every  other  proposed  scheme  is  in 
volved.  If  such  a  guide  is  unfit,  because  its  dictates  are 
variable,  then  must  Expediency  also  be  rejected  for  the  same 
reason.  If  Bentham  is  right  in  condemning  Moral  Sense, 
as  an  "  anarchical  and  capricious  principle,  founded  solely 
upon  internal  and  peculiar  feelings,"  then  is  his  own  max 
im  doubly  fallacious.  Is  not  the  idea,  "  greatest  happi 
ness,"  a  capricious  one  ?  Is  not  that  also  "  founded  solely 
upon  internal  and  peculiar  feelings  ?  "  (See  page  13.) 
And  even  were  the  idea  "  greatest  happiness  "  alike  in  all, 
would  not  his  principle  be  still  "  anarchical,"  in  virtue  of 
the  infinite  disagreement  as  to  the  means  of  realizing  this 
"greatest  happiness?"  All  utilitarian  philosophies  are 
in  fact  liable  to  this  charge  of  indefiniteness,  for  there 
ever  recurs  the  same  unsettled  question — what  is  utility  ? 
— a  question  which,  as  every  newspaper  shows  us,  gives 
rise  to  endless  disputes,  both  as  to  the  goodness  of  each 
desired  end,  and  the  efficiency  of  every  proposed  means. 
""•At  the  worst,  therefore,  in  so  far  as  want  of  scientific  pre 
cision  is  concerned,  a  philosophy  founded  on  Moral  Sense, 
simply  stands  in  the  same  category  with  all  other  known 
systems. 


FUNCTION   OF   THE   MOEAL    SENSE.  41 

§  7.  But  happily  there  is  an  alternative.  The  force  -x" 
of  the  objection  above  set  forth  may  be  fully  admitted, 
without  in  any  degree  invalidating  the  theory.  Notwith 
standing  appearances  to  the  contrary,  it  is  still  possible  to 
construct  upon  this  basis,  a  purely  synthetic  morality 
proof  against  all  such  criticism. 

The  error  pointed  out  is  not  one  of  doctrine,  but  of  S 
application.  Those  who  committed  it  did  not  start  from 
a  wrong  principle,  but  rather  missed  the  right  way  from 
that  principle  to .  the  sought-for  conclusions.  It  was  not 
in  the  oracle  to  which  they  appealed,  but  in  their  method 
of  interpretation,  that  the  writers  of  the  Shaftesbury  /" 
school  erred.  Confounding  the  functions  of  feeling  and 
reason,  they  required  a  sentiment  to  do  that,  which  should 
have  been  left  to  the  intellect.  They  were  right  in  believ 
ing  that  there  exists  someMjfpverning  instinct  generating 
in  us,  an  approval  of  certain  actions  we  call  good,  and  a 
repugnance  to  certain  others  we  call  bad.*? But  they  were 
not  right  in  assuming  such  instinct  to  be  capable  of  in 
tuitively  solving  every  ethical  problem  submitted  to  it. 
To  suppose  this,  was  to  suppose  that  moral  sense  could 
supply  the  place  of  logic. 

For  the  better  explanation  of  this  point,  let  us  take  an 
analogy  from  mathematics,  or  rather  some  branch  of  it,  as 
geometry.  The  human  mind  possesses  a  faculty  that  takes 
cognizance  of  measurable  quantity,  which  faculty,  to  carry 
out  the  analogy,  let  us  term  a  geometric  sense.  By  the 
help  of  this  we  estimate  the  linear  dimensions,  surfaces, 
and  bulks  of  surrounding  objects,  and  form  ideas  of  their 
relationship  to  each  other.  But  in  the  endeavour  to  re 
duce  the  knowledge  thus  obtained  to  a  scientific  form,  we 
find  that  no  reliance  can  be  placed  on  the  unaided  decis 
ions  of  this  geometric  sense,  in  consequence  of  the  conflict 
ing  judgments  it  makes  in  different  persons.  On  compar 
ing  notes,  however,  we  discover  that  there  are  certain 


Vj 

vV<A 


42  INTKODUCTION. 

simple  propositions  upon  which  we  all  think  alike,  such 
as  "  Things  which  are  equal  to  the  same  thing  are  equal 
to  one  another ;  "  "  The  whole  is  greater  than  its  part ;  " 
and  agreeing  upon  these  axioms  as  we  call  them — these 
fundamental  truths  recognized  by  our  geometric  sense,  we 
find  it  becomes  possible  by  successive  deductions  to  settle 
all  disputed  points,  and  to  solve  with  certainty,  problems 
of  the  most  complicated  nature.*  Now  if,  instead  of 
adopting  this  method,  geometricians  had  persisted  in 
determining  all  questions  concerning  lines,  angles,  squares, 
circles,  and  the  like,  by  the  geometric  sense — if  they  had 
tried  to  discover  whether  the  three  angles  of  a  triangle 
were,  or  were  not,  equal  to  two  right  angles,  and  whether 
the  areas  of  similar  polygons  were,  or  were  not,  in  the 
duplicate  ratio  of  their  homologous  sides,  by  an  eifort  of 
simple  perception,  they  would  have  made  just  the  same 
mistake  that  moralists  make,  who  try  to  solve  all  the  prob 
lems  of  morality  by  the  moral  sense. 

The  reader  will  at  once  perceive  the  conclusion  toward 
which  this  analogy  points ;  namely,  that  the  perception  of 
the  primary  laws  of  quantity  bears  the  same  relationship 
to  mathematics,  that  this  instinct  of  right  bears  to  a  moral 
system;  and  that  as  it  is  the  office  of  the  geometric  sense 
to  originate  a  geometric  axiom,  from  which  reason  may 
deduce  a  scientific  geometry,  so  it  is  the  office  of  the 
moral  sense  to  originate  a  moral  axiom,  from  which  reason 
may  develop  a  systematic  morality. 

*— ^  And,  varying  the  illustration,  it  may  be  further 
remarked,  that  just  as  erroneous  notions  in  mechanics — 
for  instance,  that  large  bodies  fall  faster  than  small 

*  Whether  we  adopt  the  views  of  Locke  or  of  Kant  as  to  the  ultimate 
nature  of  what  is  here,  for  analogy's  sake,  called  geometric  sense,  does  not 
affect  the  question.  However  originated,  the  fundamental  perceptions 
attaching  to  it  form  the  undecornposable  basis  of  exact  science.  And  this 
is  all  that  is  now  assumed. 


*v 

GROUNDS    OF   A    SCIENTIFIC   MORALITY.  4:3 


ones ;  *  that  water  rises  in  a  pump  by  suction ;  that  perpet 
ual  motion  is  possible,  together  with  the  many  other  mis 
taken  opinions,  formed  by  unaided  mechanical  sense — are  '" 
set -aside  by  the  conclusions  synthetically  deduced  from 
those  primary  laws  of  matter  which  the  mechanical  sense 
recognizes  ;  so  may  we  expect  the  multitudes  of  conilicting 
beliefs  about  human  duty  dictated  by  unaided  moral 
sense,  to  disappear  before  the  deductions  scientifically 
drawn  from  some  primary  laAV  of  man  which  the  moral 
sense  recognizes. 

§  8'  On  reviewing  the  claims  of  the  Moral  Sense  doc 
trine,  it  appears  that  there  is  d  priori  reason  for  expect 
ing  the  first  principle  of  social  morality  to  originate  in 
some  feeling,  power,  or  faculty  of  the  individual.  Quite 
in  harmony  with  this  belief,  is  the  inference  that  as  desire 
is  found  to  be  the  incentive  to  action  where  motives  are 
readily  analyzable,  it  is  probably  the  universal  incentive ; 
and  that  the  conduct  we  call  moral  is  determined  by  it  as 
well  as  other  conduct.  Moreover  we  find  that  even  the 
great  maxim  of  the  expediency-philosophy  presupposes 
some  tendency  in  man  toward  right  relationship  with  his 
fellow,  and  some  correlative  perception  of  what  that  right 
relationship  consists  in.  There  are  sundry  phenomena  of 
social  life,  both  past  and  present,  that  well  illustrate"the 
influence  of  this  supposed  moral  sense,  and  which  are  not  ^ 
readily  explicable  upon  any  other  hypothesis.  Assuming 
the  existence  of  such  a  faculty,  there  appears  reason  to 
think  that  its  monitions  afford  a  proper  basis  for  a  sys 
tematic  morality ;  and  to  the  demurrer  that  their  varia 
bility  unfits  them  for  this  purpose,  it  is  replied  that,  to 
say  the  least,  the  foundations  of  all  other  systems  are 
equally  open  to  the  same  objection.  Finally,  however, 

*  A  doctrine  held  by  Aristotle  and  his  followers. 


44:  INTRODUCTION. 

we  discover  that  this  difficulty  is  apparent  only,  and  not 
real :  for  that  whilst  the  decisions  of  this  moral  sense  upon 
the  complex  cases  referred  to  it  are  inaccurate  and  often 
contradictory,  it  may  still  be  capable  of  generating  a  true 
fundamental  intuition,  which  can  be  logically  unfolded 
into  a  scientific  morality. 


LEMMA  I. 

§  1.  It  seems  at  first  sight  a  very  rational  way  of 
testing  any  proposed  rule  of  conduct  to  ask,  How^will  it 
work  ?  Taking  men  as  we  know  them,  and  institutions 
as  they  are,  what  will  result  from  carrying  such  a  theory 
into  practice  ?  This  very  common-sense  style  of  inquiry 
is  that  by  which  most  opinions  on  morals  and  politics  are 
formed.  People  consider  of  any  system,  whether  it  seems 
feasible,  whether  it  will  square  with  this  or  the  other 
social  arrangement,  whether  it  fits  what  they  see  of  hu 
man  nature.  They  have  got  certain  notions  of  what 
man  is,  and  what  society  must  be  y  and  their  verdict  on 
any  ethical  doctrine  depends  upon  its  accordance  or  dis 
cordance  with  these. 

Such  a  mode  of  settling  moral  questions,  is  clearly 
open  to  all  the  criticisms  so  fatal  to  the  expediency-philos 
ophy.  Incapacity  for  guiding  ourselves  in  detail  by  mak 
ing  estimates  of  consequences,  implies  incapacity  for  judg 
ing  of  first  principles  by  that  method.  But  passing  over 
this,  there  is  yet  another  reason  for  rejecting  an  inquiry  so 
pursued  as  worthless ;  namely,  that  it  assumes  the  charac 
ter  of  mankind  to  be  constant.  If  moral  systems  are 
adopted  or  condemned,  because  of  their  consistency  or  in 
consistency,  with  what  we  know  of  men  and  things,  then 
it  is  taken  for  granted  that  men  and  things  will  ever  be  as 
they  are.  It  would  be  absurd  to  measure  with  a  variable 


CHANGE  THE   UNIVERSAL   LAW.  45 

standard.  If  existing  humanity  is  the  gauge  by  which 
truth  must  he  determined,  then  must  that  gauge — exist 
ing  humanity — be  fixed. 

Now  that  it  is  not  fixed,  might  have  been  thought 
sufficiently  obvious  without  any  proving — so  obvious  in 
deed  as  to  make  proof  look  ridiculous.  But,  unfortu 
nately,  those  whose  prejudices  make  them  think  otherwise, 
are  too  numerous  to  be  passed  by.  Their  scepticism 
needs  to  be  met  by  facts ;  and,  wearisome  though  it  may 
be  to  the  philosophic  reader,  there  is  no  alternative  but 
to  go  into  these. 

§  2.  And  first,  let  us  pause  a  moment  to  consider 
the  antecedent  improbability  of  this  alleged  constancy  in 
human__nat.uxe._  It  is  a  trite  enough  remark  thatf  change  is  „ 
tfteTaw  of  all  things:  true  equally  of  a  single  object,  and"' 
of  the  universe.  Nature  in  its  infinite  complexity  is  ever 
growing  to  a  new  development.  Each  successive  result 
becomes  the  parent  of  an  additional  influence,  destined  in 
some  degree  to  modify  all  future  results.  No  fresh  thread 
enters  into  the  texture  of  that  endless  web,  woven  in  "  the 
roaring  loom  of  Time,"  but  what  more  or  less  alters  the 
pattern.  It  has  been  so  from  the  beginning.  As  we  turn 
over  the  leaves  of  the  earth's  primeval  history — as  we  in 
terpret  the  hieroglyphics  in  which  are  recorded  the  events 
of  the  unknown  past,  we  find  this  same  ever-beginning, 
never-ceasing-  change.  We  see  it  alike  in  the  organic  and 
the  inorganic — in  the  decompositions  and  recombinations  of 
matter,  and  in  the  constantly-varying  forms  of  animal  and 
vegetable  life.  Old  formations  are  worn  down ;  new  ones 
are  deposited.  Forests  and  bogs  become  coal  basins ;  and 
the  now  igneous  rock  was  once  sedimentary.  With  an 
altering  atmosphere,  and  a  decreasing  temperature,  land 
and  sea  perpetually  bring  forth  fresh  races  of  insects, 
plants,  and  animals.  All  things  are  metamorphosed ;  in- 


4:6  INTRODUCTION. 

fusorial  shells  into  chalk  and  flint,  sand  into  stone,  stone 
into  gravel.  Strata  get  contorted ;  seas  fill  up ;  lands  are 
alternately  upheaved  and  sunk.  Where  once  rolled  a 
fathomless  ocean,  now  tower  the  snow-covered  peaks  of  a 
wide-spread,  richly-clothed  country,  teeming  with  exist 
ence  ;  and  where  a  vast  continent  once  stretched,  there 
remain  but  a  few  lonely  coral  islets  to  mark  the  graves  of 
its  submerged  mountains.  Thus  also  is  it  with  systems, 
as  well  as  with  worlds.  Orbits  vary  in  their  forms,  axes 
in  their  inclinations,  suns  in  their  brightness.  Fixed  only 
in  name,  the  stars  are  incessantly  changing  their  relation 
ships  to  each  other.  New  ones  from  time  to  time  suddenly 
appear,  increase,  and  wane ;  whilst  the  members  of  each 
nebula — suns,  planets,  and  their  satellites,  sweep  forever 
onward  into  unexplored  infinity. 

—•—  Strange  indeed  would  it  be,  if,  in  the  midst  of  this  uni 
versal  mutation,  man  alone  were  constant,  unchangeable. 
But  it  is  not  so.  He  also  obeys  the  law  of  indefinite  varia 
tion.  His  circumstances  are  ever  altering ;  and  he  is  ever 
adapting  himself  to  them.  Between  the  naked  houseless 
savage,  and  the  Shakspeares  and  Newtons  of  a  civilized 
state,  lie  unnumbered  degrees  of  difference.  The  contrasts 
of  races  in  form,  colour,  and  feature,  are  not  greater  than 
the  contrasts  in  their  moral  and  intellectual  qualities. 
That  superiority  of  sight  which  enables  a  Bushman  to  see 
further  with  the  naked  eye  than  a  European  with  a  tele 
scope,  is  fully  paralleled  by  the  European's  more  perfect 
intellectual  vision.  The  Calmuck  in  delicacy  of  smell, 
and  the  red  Indian  in  acuteness  of  hearing,  do  not  excel 
the  white  man  more  than  the  white  man  excels  them  in 
moral  susceptibility.  Every  age,  every  nation,  every  cli 
mate,  exhibits  a  modified  form  of  humanity ;  and  in  all 
times,  and  amongst  all  peoples,  a  greater  or  less  amount 
of  change  is  going  on. 

There  cannot  indeed  be  a  more  astounding  instance  of 


MUTATIONS   OF   MANKIND.  47 

the  tenacity  with  which  men  will  cling  to  an  opinion  in 
spite  of  an  overwhelming  mass  of  adverse  evidence,  than 
is  shown  in  this  prevalent  belief  that  human  nature  is  uni 
form.  One  would  have  thought  it  impossible  to  use  eyes 
or  ears  without  learning  that  mankind  vary  indefinitely, 
in  instincts,  in  morals,  in  opinions,  in  tastes,  in  rationality, 
in  every  thing.  Even  a  stroll  through  the  nearest  museum 
would  show  that  some  law  of  modification  was  at  work. 
Mark  the  grotesque  frescos  of  the  Egyptians,  or  the  shad- 
owless  drawings  of  the  Chinese.  Does  the  contrast  be 
tween  these  and  the  works  of  European  artists  indicate  no 
difference  in  the  perceptive  powers  of  the  races  ?  Com 
pare  the  sculptures  of  Athens  with  those  of  Hindostan  or 
Mexico.  Is  not  a  greater  sense  of  beauty  implied  by  the 
one  than  the  others  ?  But,  passing  to  the  more  significant 
facts  supplied  by  historians  and  travellers,  what  are  we  to 
think  on  reading  that  the  Greeks  and  Romans  had  a  deity 
to  sanction  and  patronize  every  conceivable  iniquity  ?  or 
when  we  hear  of  Polynesian  tribes  who  believe  that  their 
gods  feed  upon  the  souls  of  the  departed  ?  Surely  the 
characters  indicated  by  such  conceptions  of  Divinity  differ 
somewhat  from  ours  !  Surely,  too,  we  may  claim  some 
essential  superiority  .over  those  Tartars  who  leave  infirm 
parents  to  die  of  hunger  in  the  desert  ;  and  over  those 
Feejee  islanders,  amongst  whom  members  of  the  same 
family  have  to  keep  watch  against  each  other's  treachery. 
It  is  not  the  custom  of  an  Englishman  to  dine,  like  a 
Carrib,  upon  a  roasted  captive  ;  or  even  as  the  Abyssinian, 
on  a  quivering  slice  from  the  haunch  of  a  live  ox.  Neither 
does  he,  like  a  red  Indian,  delight  in  the  writhing  of  a 
victim  at  the  stake  ;  nor,  like  a  Hindoo,  burn  his  wife  that 
her  spirit  may  haunt  his  enemy. 

What  one  respect  is  there  in  which  it  can  be  asserted 
that  human  nature  is  always  the  same  ftDls  it  in  rational 
ity  ?  Why,  Anaxagoras  had  to  fly  his  country  for  having 


48  INTRODUCTION. 

blasphemously  asserted  that  the  sun  was  not  the  chariot 
of  the  deity  Helios :  whilst  amongst  ourselves  a  child  often 
puzzles  its  seniors  by  the  question,  Who  made  God ?  "Is 
it  in  justice  ?  No :  badly  as  the  moderns  have  treated 
slaves,  they  have  never,  like  the  Spartans,  encouraged 
their  young  warriors  to  waylay  and  assassinate  helots  for 
practice.  -  Is  it  in  honesty  ?  If  so,  how  come  we  to  read 
that  "  piracy  was  the  exercise,  the  trade,  the  glory,  and 
the  virtue  of  the  Scandinavian  youth ; "  whilst  amongst 
ourselves.,  privateering,  even  in  time  of  war,  is  disap 
proved  &  Is  it  in  want  of  mercy  ?  Not  so:  for  much  as 
Austrian  butcheries  have  lately  disgraced  Europe,  they 
have  not  paralleled  the  doings  of  Gengis  Khan,  who  sig 
nalized  his  first  victory  by  casting  seventy  prisoners  into 
cauldrons  of  boiling  water ;  or  of  Timour,  who  massacred 
100,000  Indian  prisoners,  and  erected  a  pyramid  of  90,000 
human  heads  on  the  smoking  ruins  of  Bagdad ;  or  of  At- 
tila,  who  totally  extirpated  and  erased  seventy  cities.  Is 
it  in  vindictiveness  ?  Why  no :  for  whilst  we  are  told  of 
the  Begum  Suniroo,  that  having  ordered  one  of  her  danc 
ing  girls  to  be  bricked  up  in  a  vault,  she  had  her  bed 
placed  over  it,  that  she  might  listen  to  her  victim's  dying 
moans ;  we  find  our  own  Queen  requesting,  much  to  her 
credit,  that  the  man  who  fired  at  her  should  not  be  flogged. 
Where  now  is  the  sameness  ?  It  is  not  in  actions  as  we 
see.  Is  it  then  in  manners  and  opinions  ?  Certainly  not. 
Society  in  our  day  would  hardly  receive  a  lady  or  gentle 
man  known  to  have  poisoned  an  enemy :  in  Italy,  how 
ever,  there  was  a  time  when  disgrace  did  not  attach  to 
such.  No  family  would  now  follow  the  example  of  the 
Yisconti,  and  choose  the  viper  for  an  armorial  bearing. 
Nor  could  we  in  the  nineteenth  century,  find  a  match  to 
that  German  captain  of  mercenaries,  who  in  silver  letters 
labelled  himself—"  Duke  Werner,  Lord  of  the  great  Com 
pany  ;  the  enemy  of  mercy,  of  pity,  and  of  God." 


EXAMPLES   OF   HUMAN   VARIABILITY.  49 

But  why  go  abroad  for  illustrations  of  human  varia 
bility  ?  have  we  not  plenty  at  home  ?  In  those  early  days 
when  it  was  thought  "  quite  sufficient  for  noblemen  to 
winde  their  horn,  and  carry  their  hawke  fair,  and  leave 
study  and  learning  to  the  children  of  mean  people  " — in 
those  days  when  men  secured  themselves  inside  thick  walls 
and  behind  deep  moats,  and  when  women  wore  daggers, 
character  was  not  just  what  we  now  find  it.  Whilst  all 
nominally  held  the  creed  professed  by  ourselves,  the  Bor 
derer  was  most  zealous  at  his  prayers  when  going  on  a 
foray ;  saints'  names  were  battle  cries ;  bishops  led  on 
their  retainers  to  fight ;  and  the  highest  piety  was  in  the 
slaying  of  Saracens.  Must  not  our  natures  have  changed 
somewhat,  when  we  translate  this  same  religion  into 
peace,  into  philanthropic  effort  of  all  kinds,  into  mission 
ary  enterprise,  into  advocacy  of  temperance,  into  inquiries 
about  "  labour  and  the  poor  "  ?  Does  the  agitation  for  the 
abolition  of  death  punishment  indicate  no  revolution  in 
men's  feelings  since  the  days  when  Cromwell's  body  was 
exhumed,  and  his  head  stuck  on  Temple  Bar — the  days 
when  criminals  were  drawn  and  quartered  as  well  as  hung 
— the  days  when  there  were  murmurs  "  because  Stafford 
was  suffered  to  die  without  seeing  his  bowels  burned  be 
fore  his  face  " — the  days  when  creaking  gibbets  were  scat 
tered  over  the  country — the  days  when  church-doors  were 
covered  with  the  skins  of  men  who  had  committed  sacri 
lege?  And  w~hen  we  read  that  Sir  John  Hawkins,  in  hon 
our  of  his  having  been  the  first  to  commence  the  slave- 
trade,  received  the  addition  to  his  coat  of  arms  of  "  a 
dcmi-moor  proper  bound  with  a  cord,"  does  it  not  seem 
that  the  national  •  character  has  improved  between  his 
times  and  ours,  when,  out  of  sympathy  for  the  negroes, 
300,000  persons  pledged  themselves  to  abstain  from  all 
West-India  produce  ? 

But  really  it  is  absurd  to  argue  the  matter.     The  very 


50  INTRODUCTION. 

asscrtors  of  this  fixedness  of  human  nature  tacitly  disown 
their  belief  in  it.  They  constantly  stultify  themselves  by 
remarks  on  differences  of  national  character,  on  peculiari 
ties  in  their  friends'  dispositions,  and  on  their  own  special 
tastes  and  feelings.  Admissions  thus  accidentally  made 
quite  invalidate  their  dogma.  Nay,  not  even  these  are 
needed.  No  comparison  between  the  habits  of  separate 
races — between  man  as  he  is  and  as  he  was — between  the 
tempers  and  talents  of  individuals — are  necessary  for  this. 
To  the  man  of  any  insight,  the  mere  fact  that  he  himself 
changes  with  circumstances,  from  day  to  day,  and  from 
year  to  year,  in  sentiments,  capacities,  and  desires,  is  suffi 
cient  to  show  that  humanity  is  indefinitely  variable. 

""  §  3.  And  if  humanity  is  indefinitely  variable,  it  can 
not  be  used  as  a  gauge  for  testing  moral  truth.  When  we 
see  that  institutions  impracticable  in  one  age  have  flour 
ished  in  a  subsequent  one ;  and  that  what  were  once  salu 
tary  laws  and  customs  have  become  repugnant ;  we  may 
shrewdly  suspect  that  the  like  changes  will  take  place  in 
future.  That  incongruity  with  the  state  of  men  and 
things  which  at  present  gives  to  certain  proposed  princi 
ples  an  appearance  of  impracticability,  may,  in  a  coming 
age,  no  longer  exist ;  and  those  principles  that  now  seem 
so  well  adapted  to  our  social  condition,  may  then  no  long 
er  harmonize  with  it.  Unless,  therefore,  we  assume  that 
"^""human  nature,  although  hitherto  variable,  will  henceforth 
remain  fixed — a  somewhat  unwarrantable  assumption — 
we  must  not  allow  the  disagreement  between  any  system 
of  ethics  and  the  present  state  of  mankind,  to  be  taken  as 
evidence  against  that  system. 

Nay  more:  not  only  ought  we  to  regard  such  disa 
greement,  when  it  appears,  without  prejudice;  but  we 
ought  to  expect  it ;  and  to  consider  it,  if  any  thing,  rather 
an  indication  of  truth  than  of  error.  It  is  preposterous 


ETHICS   MUST  DISAGEEE   WITH    INSTITUTIONS.  51 

to  look  for  consistency  between  absolute  moral  truth,  and 
the  defective  characters  and  usages  of  our  existing  state ! 
As  already  said^Morality  professes  to  be  a  code  of  rules 
proper  for_jijbhc  guidance  of  humanity  in  its  highest  con- 
ceivable  perfection."  A  universal  obedience  to  its  pre 
cepts  implies  an  ideal  society.  How  then  can  it  be  ex 
pected  to  harmonize  with  the  ideas,  and  actions,  and  insti 
tutions  of  man  as  he  now  is  ?  When  we  say  that  man 
kind  are  sinful,  weak,  frail,  we  simply  mean  that  they  do 
not  habitually  fulfil  the  appointed  law.  Imperfection  is 
merely  another  word  for  disobedience.  So  that  congruity 
between  a  true  theory  of  duty,  and  an  untrue  state  of  hu 
manity,  is  an  impossibility,  a  contradiction  in  the  nature 
of  things.  Whoever,  by  way  of  recommending  his  scheme 
of  ethics,  sets  forth  its  immediate  and  entire  practicabili 
ty,  thereby  inevitably  proves  its  falsehood.  Right  princi 
ples  of  action  become  practicable,  only  as  man  becomes 
perfect;  or  rather,  to  put  the  expressions  in  proper  se 
quence — man  becomes  perfect,  just  in  so  far  as  he  is  able 
to  obey  them. 

A  total  disagreement  may  therefore  be  looked  for  be-  — * 
tween  the  doctrines  promulgated  in  the  following  pages, 
and  the  institutions  amidst  which  we  live.     And  the  reader 
will  be  prepared  to  view  such  disagreement  not  only  as 
consistent  with  their  truth,  but  as  adding  to  its  probability. 


JLEMMA  II. 

And  yet,  unable  as  the  imperfect  man  may  be  to  fulfil 
the  perfect  law,  there  is  no  other  law  for  him.  One  right 
course  only  is  open ;  and  he  must  either  follow  that  or 
take  the  consequences.  The  conditions  of  existence  will 
not  bend  before  his  perversity ;  nor  relax  in  consideration 
of  his  weakness.  Neither,  when  they  are  broken,  may 


52  INTEODUCTION. 

any  exception  from  penalties  be  hoped  for.  "  Obey  or 
suffer,"  are  the  ever-repeated  alternatives.  Disobedience 
is  sure  to  be  convicted.  And  there  are  no  reprieves. 

It  is  indeed  the  favourite  maxim  of  a  certain  popular 
philosophy,  that  "there  is  no  rule  without  an  exception" — 
a  maxim  about  as  respectable  as  the  proverbs  along  with 
which  it  commonly  passes  current.  Applied  to  conven 
tional  usages — to  the  tenets  of  state  policy — to  social  reg 
ulations—to  the  precepts  of  pocket  prudence — to  the  laws 
of  grammar,  of  art,  of  etiquette — or  to  those  common 
aphorisms  which  roughly  classify  the  experiences  of  every 
day  life,  it  may  be  true  enough ;  but  if  affirmed  of  the 
essential  principles  of  things,  of  society,  of  man,  it  is  ut- 
y  terly  false. 

^VlSTature's  rules,  on  the  contrary,  have  no  exceptions. 
The  apparent  ones  are  only  apparent ;  not  real.  They  are 
indications  either  that  we  have  not  found  the  true  law,  or 
that  we  have  got  an  imperfect  expression  of  it.  Thus,  if 
terrestrial  gravitation  be  defined  as  "  a  tendency  possessed 
by  all  free  bodies  to  descend  towards  the  centre  of  the 
earth,"  you  may  triumphantly  add — "  all  free  bodies  ex 
cept  the  balloon."  But  your  balloon  is  no  exception.  Its 
ascent  is  just  as  much  a  result  of  gravitation  as  the  falling 
of  a  stone.  You  have  merely  proved  that  the  definition 
does  not  adequately  express  the  law.  Again,  to  the  asser 
tion  that  exercise  increases  strength — you  may  answer, 
that  although  generally  true,  it  is  not  true  of  invalids,  to 
whom  exercise  is  often  detrimental ;  and  that  it  is  only  true 
of  the  healthy  within  certain  limits.  Just  so.  But  such 
qualifications  would  have  been  needless,  if  the  law  had 
been  completely  stated.  Had  it  been  said  that — so  long 
as  the  power  of  assimilation  is  sufficient  to  make  good  the 
waste  consequent  upon  exercise,  exercise  increases  strength 
— no  limitations  could  have  been  discovered.  The  so- 
called  exceptions  are  in  ourselves,  not  in  nature.  They 


CONSTANCY   OF   THE   DIVINE   KULE.  53 

show  either  that  the  law  eludes  our  perception,  or  baffles 
our  power  of  expression. 

Rightly  understood,  the   progress,  from   deepest  igno-^ 
ranee  to  highest  enlightenment,  is  a  progress  from  entire 
unconsciousness  of  law,  to  the  conviction  that  law  is  uni-  / 
versal  and  inevitable.     Accumulating  knowledge  and  con 
tinual  induction  are  ever  restricting  the  old  ideas  of  spe 
cial  causation  within  narrower  limits.     Each  new  discov 
ery  in   science — every  anomaly  solved — strengthens  men 
in  the  belief  that  phenomena  result  from  general  uniform 
forces.     And   at   length,  by  dint   of  constantly-repeated 
evidence,  they  begin  to  perceive  that  there  are  no  suspen 
sions  of  these  forces  even  for  the  avoidance  of  the  most 
terrific   catastrophes.     They  see  that   although  fleets  be 
sent  to  the  bottom  by  the  resulting  storm,  yet  must  at 
mospheric   equilibrium  be  restored.     They  see  that   the 
earth  does  not  cease  its  attraction,  even  to  save  a  village 
from  the  impending  avalanche.     They  see  that,  regardless 
of  the  consequent  destruction  of  a  church,  or  blowing  up 
of  a  vessel,  the  electric  fluid  will  still  follow  "  the  line  of 
least  resistance."     They  see  that  chemical  affinity  must 
act,  notwithstanding  it  ends  in  the  burning  of  a  city  to 
ashes — in  the  submergence  of  half  a  country  by  volcanic 
listurbance — or  in  the  loss  of  a  hundred  thousand  lives 
by  an  epidemic.     Every  increment  of  knowledge  goes  to 
^how  that  constancy  is  an  essential  attribute  of  the  Di- 
idne  rule  :  an  unvaryingness  which  renders  the  eclipse  of 
M  hundred  years  hence  predicable  to  a  moment !     And  for 
he  end  of  these  unbending  ordinances  of  nature — we  find  / 
t  to  be  the  universal  good.     To  render  the  world  habita- 
)le ;  that  is  the  great  object.     The  minor  evils  due  to  this 
>ersistency  of  action  are  as  nothing  compared  with  the  / 
nfinite  benefits  secured.     Whether  those  evils  might  or 
aight  not  have  been  avoided,  we  need  not  now  consider, 
t  is  enough  for  us  to  know  that  constancy  is  the  law,  and 


k  • 

INTRODUCTION. 


^  we  have  no  alternative  but  to  assume  that  law  to  be  the 
best  possible  one. 

§  2.  As  with  the  physical,  so  with  the  ethical.  A 
belief,  as  yet  fitful  and  partial,  is  beginning  to  spread 
amongst  men,  that  here  also  there  is  an  indissoluble  bond 
between  cause  and  consequence,  an  inexorable  destiny,  a 
"  law  which  altereth  not."  Confounded  by  the  multiplied 
and  ever-new  aspects  of  human  affairs,  it  is  not  perhaps 
surprising  that  men  should  fail  duly  to  recognize  the  sys 
tematic  character  of  the  Divine  rule.  Yet  in  the  moral  as 
in  the  material  world,  accumulated  evidence  is  gradually 
generating  the  conviction,  that  events  are  not  at  bottom 
fortuitous ;  but  that  they  are  wrought  out  in  a  certain  in 
evitable  way  by  unchanging  forces.  In  all  ages  there  has 
been  some  glimmering  perception  of  this  truth ;  and  ex 
perience  is  ever  giving  to  that  perception  increased  dis 
tinctness.  Indeed  even  now  all  men  do,  in  one  mode  or 
other,  testify  of  such  a  faith.  Every  known  creed  is  an 
assertion  of  it.  .What  are  the  moral  codes  of  the  Mahom 
etan,  the  Brahmin,  the  Buddhist,  but  so  many  acknowl 
edgments  of  the  inseparable  connection  between  conduct 
and  its  results  ?  Do  they  not  all  say  you  shall  not  do 
this,  and  this,  because  they  will  produce  evil;  and  you 
shall  do  that,  and  that,  because  they  will  produce  good  ? 
~No  matter  that  their  founders  erred  in  the  attempt  to  refer 
each  effect  to  its  special  cause,  and  so  botched  their  sys 
tems  of  morality ;  notwithstanding  this,  they  evinced  the 
belief  that  there  is  an  inevitable  law  of  causation  in  hu 
man  affairs,  which  it  is  for  man  to  learn  and  conform  to. 
And  is  not  this  the  doctrine  of  the  highest  known  relig 
ion  ?  Does  not  Christianity  also  teach  that  such  and  such 
deeds  shall  surely  end  in  such  and  such  issues — evil-doing 
in  punishment,  well-doing  in  reward — and  that  these 
things  are  necessarily  and  indissolubly  connected  ?  We 


INTLEXIBLENESS   OF  MOEAL   LAWS.  55 

imply  such  a  faith,  too,  in  our  every-day  conversations ;  in 
our  maxims  and  precepts,  in  our  education  of  children,  in 
our  advice  to  friends.  In  judging  men  and  things  we  in 
stinctively  refer  them  to  some  standard  of  ascertained 
principles.  We  predict  good  or  evil  of  this  or  the  other 
scheme,  because  of  its  accordance  or  discordance  with  cer 
tain  perceived  laws  of  life.  Nay,  even  the  pettifogging 
red-tapist,  with  his  hand-to-mouth  expediency,  and  pro 
fessed  contempt  for  "  abstract  principles,"  has  really  a  se 
cret  consciousness  of  some  such  invariable  sequence  of 
events — does  really  believe  in  the  sway  of  that  "  benefi 
cent  necessity "  which  to  a  given  act  attaches  a  fixed  re 
sult.  For  what  is  the  true  meaning  of  his  "  measures" — 
his  "projects  of  law"?  He  does  not  think  it  a  toss-up 
whether  this,  or  that,  effect  will  be  produced  by  them. 
If  he  did,  he  would  be  as  ready  to  adopt  one  plan  as 
another.  Evidently  he  sees  that  there  are  constant  influ 
ences  at  work,  which,  from  each  circumstance,  or  set  of 
circumstances,  educe  an  unavoidable  consequence;  and 
that  under  like  conditions  like  events  will  again  follow. 

Surely,  then,  if  all  believe  in  the  persistency  of  these 
secondary  laws,  much  more  should  they  believe  in  the  per 
sistency  of  those  primary  ones,  which  underlie  human  ex 
istence,  and  out  of  which  our  every-day  truths  grow.  We 
cannot  deny  the  root,  if  we  recognize  the  branches.  And 
if  such  is  the  constitution  of  things,  we  are  compelled  to 
admit  this  same  "  beneficent  necessity."  There  is  no  al 
ternative.  Either  society  has  laws,  or  it  has  not.  If  it 
lias  not,  there  can  be  no  order,  no  certainty,  no  system  in 
its  phenomena.  If  it  has,  then  are  they  like  the  other 
laws  of  the  universe — sure,  inflexible,  ever  active,  and 
having  no  exceptions. 

§  3.  How  infinitely  important  is  it,  that  we  should 
ascertain  what  these  laws  are ;  and  having  ascertained, 


56  INTRODUCTION. 

implicitly  obey  them !  If  they  really  exist,  then  only  by 
submission  to  them  can  any  thing  permanently  succeed. 
Just  in  so  far  as  it  complies  with  the  principles  of  moral 
equilibrium  can  it  stand.  Our  social  edifice  may  be  con 
structed  with  all  possible  labour  and  ingenuity,  and  be 
strongly  cramped  together  with  cunningly-devised  enact 
ments,  but  if  there  be  no  rectitude  in  its  component  parts — 
if  it  is  not  built  on  upright  principles,  it  will  assuredly 
tumble  to  pieces.  As  well  might  we  seek  to  light  a  fire 
with  ice,  feed  cattle  on  stones,  hang  our  hats  on  cobwebs, 
or  otherwise  disregard  the  physical  laws  of  the  world,  as 
go  contrary  to  its  equally  imperative  ethical  laws. 

Yes,  but  there  are  exceptions,  say  you.  We  cannot 
always  be  strictly  guided  by  abstract  principles.  Pruden 
tial  considerations  must  have  some  weight.  It  is  neces 
sary  to  use  a  little  policy. 

Very  specious,  no  doubt,  are  your  reasons  for  advocat 
ing  this  or  the  other  exception.  But  if  there  be  any 
truth  in  the  foregoing  argument,  no  infraction  of  the  law 
can  be  made  with  impunity.  Those  cherished  schemes  by 
which  you  propose  to  attain  some  desired  good  by  a  little 
politic  disobedience,  are  all  delusive.  Were  any  one  to 
tell  you  that  he  had  invented  a  mechanical  combination, 
which  doubled  power  without  diminishing  velocity,  or 
that  he  had  discovered  the  quadrature  of  the  circle,  or 
that  he  knew  the  receipt  for  the  philosopher's  stone,  or 
that  he  could  sell  you  a  child's  caul  which  would  save  you 
from  drowning,  you  would  reply,  that  whilst  there  were 
laws  of  matter,  such  things  could  not  be — that  they  were 
proved  impossibilities.  Exactly  so.  But  rest  satisfied 
that  they  are  not  more  complete  impossibilities  than  are 
your  proposed  achievements  which  similarly  conflict  with 
the  essential  laws  of  life. 

It  may  indeed  be  difficult  for  those  who  have  but  little 
faith  in  the  invisible,  to  follow  out  a  principle  unninch- 


TWOFOLD   EVILS    OF   WRONG-   ACTS.  57 

ingly,  in  spite  of  every  threatening  evil — to  give  up  their 
own  power  of  judging  what  seems  best,  from  the  belief 
that  that  only  is  best  which  is  abstractedly  right — to  say, 
"  although  appearances  are  against  it,  yet  will  I  obey  the 
law."  Nevertheless,  this  is  the  true  attitude  to  assume : 
the  conduct  which  it  has  been  the  object  of  all  moral 
teaching  to  inculcate ;  the  only  conduct  which  can  event 
ually  answer.* 

§  4.  Even  supposing  for  a  moment,  that  a  solitary 
act  of  disobedience  may  pass  without  evil  results — nay, 
may  bring  beneficial  ones :  even  supposing  this,  the  wis 
dom  of  the  act  is  not  thereby  proved.  For  consider  the 
probable  effects  of  a  wrong  precedent.  As  Paley  truly 
says,  "  the  bad  consequences  of  actions  are  twofold,  par 
ticular  and  general"  And  admitting  even  that  a  particu 
lar  good  has  been  secured,  a  far  greater  general  evil  has 
been  entailed  by  opening  the  way  to  future  disobedience. 
There  is  no  security  in  this  lax  creed.  One  breach  of  the 
law  leaves  a  gap  for  numberless  subsequent  trespasses. 
If  the  first  false  step  has  been  taken  with  seeming  impu- 
jnity,  it  will  inevitably  be  followed  by  others.  School-boy 
promises  of — "only  this  once,"  are  not  to  be  believed. 
Make  a  hole  through  a  principle  to  admit  a  solitary  excep- 
ijtion,  and,  on  one  pretence  or  other,  exceptions  will  by  and 
-;by  be  thrust  through  after  it,  as  to  render  the  principle 
jjutterly  good  for  nothing.  In  fact,  if  its  consequences  are 

*  Coleridge  clearly  expresses  such  a  belief.  He  says — "  This  is  indeed 
fche  main  characteristic  of  the  moral  system  taught  by  the  Friend  through- 
•nit ;  that  the  distinct  foresight  of  consequences  belongs  exclusively  to  the 
Jnfinite  Wisdom  which  is  one  with  the  Almighty  Will,  on  which  all  conse 
quences  depend ;  but  that  for  man — to  obey  the  simple  unconditional  com- 
Inandment  of  eschewing  every  act  that  implies  a  self-contradiction,  or,  in 
»ther  words,  to  produce  and  maintain  the  greatest  possible  harmony  in  the 
ttomponent  impulses  and  faculties  of  his  nature,  involves  the  effects  of  pru 
dence." — The  Friend. 
3* 


58  INTRODUCTION. 

closely  traced,  this  same  plea  for  licence  in  special  cases 
turns  out  to  be  the  source  of  nearly  all  the  evils  that  afflict 
us.  Almost  every  wrong  doing  is  excused  by  the  doer  on 
this  ground.  He  confesses  his  act  is  at  variance  with  the 
moral  law,  which  he  admits  to  be,  and  in  some  sort  be 
lieves  to  be,  the  best  guide.  He  thinks,  however,  that  his 
interest  requires  him  now  and  then  to  make  exceptions. 
All  men  do  this ; — and  see  the  result. 

§  5.  But  can  we  ever  be  sure  that  an  exceptional 
disobedience  will  bring  the  anticipated  benefits  ?  Whoso 
would  forsake  for  a  time  a  confessedly-legitimate  guide, 
should  remember  that  he  is  falling  back  upon  that  expe 
diency-hypothesis  of  which  we  have  already  seen  the  fals 
ity.  He  is  laying  claim  to  a  perfect  knowledge  of  man, 
of  society,  of  institutions,  of  events,  of  all  the  complex, 
ever-varying  phenomena  of  human  existence ;  and  to  a 
grasp  of  mind  that  can  infer  from  these  how  things  will 
go  in  future.  In  short,  he  is  assuming  that  same  omni 
science,  which,  as  we  saw,  is  requisite  for  the  successful 
carrying  out  of  such  a  system.  Does  he  shrink  from  arro 
gating  as  much  ?  Then  observe  his  dilemma.  He  deserts 
what  he  admits  to  be  on  the  whole  a  safe  rule  oT~conduct, 
to  follow  one  which  is  difficult  to  understand ;  unsettled 
in  its  directions ;  doubtful  in  its  consequences. 

If  the  foolishness  of  such  conduct  needs  illustrating  by 
facts,  there  are  plenty  at  hand*  The  constant  failure  of 
schemes  devised  without  consulting  ethical  principles  has 
been  already  exemplified  (see  page  19).  Let  us  now,  how 
ever,  take  a  few  cases  specially  applying  to  the  present 
point — cases  in  which  benefit  has  been  sought  by  going 
in  palpable  opposition  to  those  principles — cases  in  which 
men,  dissatisfied  with  the  road  whose  finger-post  declares 
that  "  Honesty  is  the  best  policy,"  have  diverged  into  the 


THE   CALCULATED   ADVANTAGES    OF    SLAVEEY.  59 

by-ways  of  injustice,  in  the  hope  of  more  readily  attaining 
their  ends. 

The  enslavement  of  the  negroes  serves  for  a  good  ex 
ample.  Nothing  could  have  seemed  more  conclusive  than 
the  reasoning  of  unscrupulous  colonists  on  this  matter. 
Here  were  rich  soils,  a  splendid  climate,  and  a  large  mar 
ket  for  the  sale  of  produce.  Now,  could  but  a  sufficiency 
of  labourers  be  imported  and  reduced  to  servitude,  what 
profit  they  would  bring  to  their  possessors  !  Maintained 
at  a  cheap  rate;  made  to  Avorb"  hard,  and  to  keep  long  at 
it,  what  a  surplus  would  they  not  create  !  Here  was  a  mine 
of  wealth !  Well :  the  planters  acted  out  their  thought 
— did  that  which,  although  it  might  not  be  just,  was 
apparently  "  the  best  policy,"  so  far  as  they  were  con 
cerned.  Their  golden  visions  have  been  far  from  realized 
however.  Slaya-  countries  are  comparatively  poverty- 
stricken  all  over  the  world.  Though  Jamaica  at  one  time 
sent  us  a  few  overgrown  nabobs,  yet  West-Indian  history 
has  been  a  history  of  distress  and  complainings,  in  spite 
of  continual  assistance  and  artificial  advantages.  The 
southern  states  of  America  are  far  behind  their  northern 
•neighbours  in  prosperity — are  in  process  of  abandoning 
slavery  one  after  another,  in  consequence  of  its  ruinous 
results.  Somehow  the  scheme  has  not  answered  as  was 
expected.  Though  worked  in  some  cases  sixteen  hours 
out  of  the  twenty-four ;  though  supported  on  "  a  pint  of 
pour  and  one  salt  herring  per  day ;  "  though  kept  to  his 
(work  by  whips,  yet  did  not  the  slave  bring  to  his  owner 
Ifche  large  profit  calculated  upon.  Indeed  it  has  turned 
out  that,  under  like  circumstances,  free  labour  is  much 
Cheaper.  And  then,  besides  the  disappointment,  there 
ipame  results  that  were  never  looked  for.  Slaverv  brought 

fc~***-— .,      *  ^ 

in  its  train  the  multiplied  curses  of  a  diseased  social  state ; 
|R  reign  of  mutual  hatred  and  terror ;  of  universal  demorali 
zation  ;  of  sin-begotten  recklessness ;  of  extravagant  ex- 


60 

t 

penditure ;  of  bad  cultivation,  exhausted  soils,  mortgaged 
estates,  bankruptcy,  beggary.  After  all,  the  moral  law 
would  have  been  the  safest  guide. 

When  Philip  of  ValoiS1-  swore  the  officers  of  his  mint 
to  conceal  the  debasement  of  the  coinage,  and  to  endeav 
our  to  make  the  merchants  believe  that  the  gold  and  sil 
ver  pieces  were  of  full  value,  he  thought  that  although 
perhaps  unprincipled,  such  a  measure  would  be  vastly 
profitable.  And  so  no  doubt  believed  the  other  kings, 
who,  in  the  "  good  old  times,"  almost  universally  did  the 
like.  They  overreached  themselves,  however,  as  all  such 
schemers  do.  It  is  true  that  their  debts  were  diminished 
"  in  proportion  to  the  reduction  in  the  value  of  the  cur 
rency  ;  but  their  revenues  were  at  the  same  time  reduced 
in  the  like  ratio.  Moreover,  the  loss  of  their  reputation 
for  honesty  made  them  afterwards  unable  to  borrow 
money,  except  at  proportionately  high  rates  of  interest, 
to  cover  the  risk  ran  by  the  lender."  So  that  they  not 
only  lost  on  the  creditor  side  of  their  accounts  what  they 
gained  on  the  debtor  side,  but  put  themselves  at  a  great 
disadvantage  for  the  future.  After  centuries  of  dearly- 
bought  experience,  the  practice  was  reluctantly  aban 
doned,  and  is  now  universally  exploded  as  essentially 
suicidal — -just  as  suicidal  in  fact  as  all  other  infringements 
of  the  rule  of  right. 

Let  us  remember  also,  the  failure  of  those  attempts  to 
profit  at  the  expense  of  our  American  colonies ;  and  the 
disastrous  results  to  which  they  led.  Our  governors 
thought  it  would  be  highly  beneficial  to  the  mother  coun 
try,  if  the  colonies  were  constrained  to  become  her  cus 
tomers  ;  and  in  pursuance  of  this  conclusion,  not  only 
prohibited  the  settlers  from  purchasing  certain  goods  from 
any  other  country  than  England,  but  actually  denied 
them  the  right  to  make  those  goods  for  themselves  !  As 
usual  the  manoeuvre  proved  worse  than  abortive.  The 


Cl 


CASE   OF   THE   EAST  INDIA   OOMPAIC 
A  II 

outlay  required  to  keep  open  this  natioiml  tract-shop 
was  greater  than  the  receipts.  Nay,  indeed,  tjbnt  outlay 
was  wholly  thrown  away,  and  worse  than  thrown  away ; 
for  it  turns  out  that  artificial  trades  so  obtained  entail 
loss  upon  both  parties.  Then  too  came  the  punishment, 
the  resistance  of  the  settlers,  the  war  of  independence, 
and  the  hundred  and  odd  millions  added  to  our  national 
burdens ! 

What  an  astounding  illustration  of  the  defeat  of  dis 
honesty  by  the  eternal  laws  of  things  we  have  in  the  his 
tory  of  the  East  India  Company !  Selfish,  unscrupulous, 
worldly-wise  in  policy,  and  with  unlimited  force  to  back 
it,  this  oligarchy,  year  by  year,  perseveringly  earned  out 
its  schemes  of  aggrandisement.  It  subjugated  province 
upon  province ;  it  laid  one  prince  after  another  under  trib 
ute  ;  it  made  exorbitant  demands  upon  adjacent  rulers, 
and  construed  refusal  into  a  pretext  for  aggression ;  it 
became  sole  proprietor  of  thea  land,  claiming  nearly  one- 
half  the  produce  as  rent ;  and  it  entirely  monopolized 
commerce :  thus  uniting  in  itself  the  character  of  con 
queror,  ruler,  landowner,  and  merchant.  With  all  these 
resources,  what  could  it  be  but  prosperous  ?  From  the 
spoils  of  victorious  war,  the  rent  of  millions  of  acres,  the 
tribute  of  dependent  monarchs,  the  profits  of  an  exclusive 
trade,  what  untold  wealth  must  have  poured  in  upon  it ! 
what  revenues  !  what  a  bursting  exchequer !  Alas  !  the 
Company  is  some  50,000,000^  in  debt. 

Protected  trades,  too,  have  afforded  many  proofs  of  the 
impolicy  of  injustice.  The  history  of  the  wool  business 
some  centuries  ago  might  be  quoted  as  one ;  but  let  us 
take  the  more  recent  case  of  silk.  Under  the  now  happily 
exploded  plea  of  protection  to  native  industry,  the  silk 
manufacturers  were  freed  from  all  foreign  competition. 
Their  prices  were  thus  artificially  raised,  and  all  the  nation 
was  compelled  to  buy  of  them.  And  so,  having  a  large 


62  mTEODUQTION. 

market  and  profits,  they  thought  their  prosperity  ensured. 
They  were  doomed  to  disappointment,  however.  Instead 
of  a  brisk  and  extensive  trade,  they  obtained  a  languishing 
and  confined  one ;  and  that  branch  of  manufacture,  which 
was  to  have  been  a  pattern  of  commercial  greatness, 
became  a  by-word  for  whining  poverty.  How  utterly 
absurd,  under  such  a  lamentable  state  of  things,  must 
have  appeared  the  proposal  to  return  toward  equitable 
dealing  by  lowering  the  duties !  What  "  impracticables  " 
must  those  men  have  been  thought,  who,  because  mo 
nopoly  was  unjust,  wished  to  expose  the  almost  ruined 
manufacturers  to  the  additional  difficulty  of  foreign  com 
petition  !  Could  any  thing  be  more  contrary  to  common 
sense  ?  Here  surely  was  a  case  in  which  "  abstract  prin 
ciples  "  must  give  way  to  "  policy."  No :  even  here,  too, 
obedience  to  the  moral  law  proved  to  be  the  best.  Re 
bellion  against  it  had  been  punished  by  accumulated  dis 
tresses  :  a  partial  submission  was  rewarded  by  an  increase 
of  prosperity.  Within  fourteen  years  from  the  date  at 
which  the  duties  were  lowered,  the  trade  had  more  than 
doubled  itself— had  increased  more  within  that  period 
than  during  the  preceding  century.  And  those  who,  but 
a  short  time  before,  were  unable  to  meet  their  French 
compeers  in  the  home-markets,  not  only  began  to  compete 
with  them  in  the  marts  of  other  nations,  but  to  send  large 
quantities  of  goods  to  France  itself. 

**-These  are  but  a  few  samples  from  a  universal  experi 
ence.  If  diligently  traced,  the  results  of  abandoning  the 
"right  to  pursue  the  politic  will  uniformly  be  found  to  end 
thus.  Men  who  are  insane  enough  to  think  that  they  may 
safely  violate  the  fundamental  laws  of  right  conduct,  may 
read  in  such  defeats  and  disasters  their  own  fate.  Let 
them  but  inquire,  and  they  will  find  that  each  petty  evil, 
each  great  catastrophe,  is  in  some  way  or  other  a  sequence 
of  injustice.  Monetary  panics,  South-Sea  bubbles,  Rail- 


THE   CUEEENT   CONCEPTION   OF   IIISTOEY.  63 

way  manias,  Irish  rebellions,  French  revolutions, — these, 
and  the  miseries  flowing  from  them,  are  but  the  cumula 
tive  effects  of  dishonesty.  A  bitter  experience  teaches 
all  men  when  it  is  too  late,  that,  alike  in  national  and 
individual  affairs,  entire  submission  is  the  wisest  course. 
Even  Napoleon,  after  his  seeming  success,  his  triumphs, 
his  profound  statesmanship,  his  far-seeing  "  policy,"  ended 
in  the  belief  that  "  There  is  no  power  without  justice." 

Yet  this  commentary  on  the  moral  code — this  History 
as  we  call  it — men  forever  read  in  vain !  Poring  with 
microscopic  eye  over  the  symbols  in  which  it  is  written, 
they  are  heedless  of  the  great  facts  expressed  by  them. 
Instead  of  collecting  evidence  bearing  upon  the  all-impor 
tant  question,  What  are  the  laws  that  determine  national 
success  or  failure,  stability  or  revolution  ? — they  gossip 
about  state  intrigues,  sieges  and  battles,  court  scandal, 
the  crimes  of  nobles,  the  quarrels  of  parties,  the  births, 
deaths,  and  marriages  of  kings,  and  other  like  trifles. 
Minutiae,  pettifogging  details,  the  vanity  and  frippery  of 
bygone  times,  the  mere  decorations  of  the  web  of  exist 
ence,  they  examine,  analyze,  and  learnedly  descant  upon ; 
yet  are  blind  to  those  stern  realities  which  each  age 
shrouds  in  its  superficial  tissue  of  events — those  terrible 
truths  which  glare  out  upon  us  from  the  gloom  of  the  past. 
From  the  successive  strata  of  our  historical  deposits,  they 
diligently  gather  all  the  highly-coloured  fragments, 
pounce  upon  every  thing  that  is  curious  and  sparkling, 
and  chuckle  like  children  over  their  glittering  acquisi 
tions  ;  meanwhile  the  rich  veins  of  wisdom  that  ramify 
amidst  this  worthless  debris,  lie  utterly  neglected.  Cum 
brous  volumes  of  rubbish  are  greedily  accumulated,  whilst 
those  masses  of  rich  ore,  that  should  have  been  dug  out, 
and  from  which  golden  truths  might  have  been  smelted, 
are  left  unthought  of  and  unsought. 


64:  INTRODUCTION. 

§  6.  But  why  all  this  laboured  examination  into  the 
propriety,  or  impropriety,  of  making  exceptions  to  an 
ascertained  ethical  law  ?  The  very  question  is  absurd. 
For  what  does  a  man  really  mean  by  saying  of  a  thing 
that  it  is  "theoretically  just,"  or  "true  in  principle,"  or 
"  abstractedly  right "  ?  Simply  that  it  accords  with  what 
he,  in  some  way  or  other,  perceives  to  be  the  established 
arrangements  of  Divine  rule.  When  he  admits  that  an 
act  is  "theoretically  just,"  he  admits  it  to  be  that  which, 
in  strict  duty,  should  be  done.  By  "  true  in  principle," 
he  means  in  harmony  with  the  conduct  decreed  for  us. 
The  course  which  he  calls  "  abstractedly  right,"  he  be 
lieves  to  be  the  appointed  way  to  human  happiness. 
There*  is  no  escape.  The  expressions  mean  this,  or  they 
mean  nothing.  Practically,  therefore,  when  he  proposes 
to  disobey,  he  does  so  in  the  hope  of  improving  on  this 
guidance  !  Though  told  that  such  and  such  are  the  true 
roads  to  happiness,  he  opines  that  he  knows  shorter  ones ! 
~~  To  the  Creator's  silent  command — "  Do  this  ; "  he  replies 
that,  all  things  considered,  he  thinks  he  can  do  better ! 
This  is  the  real  Infidelity ;  the  true  Atheism :  to  doubt 
the  foresight  and  efficiency  of  the  Divine  arrangements, 
and  with  infinite  presumption  to  suppose  a  human  judg 
ment  less  fallible  !  When  will  man  "  cease  his  frantic 
pretension  of  scanning  this  great  God's  World  in  his  small 
fraction  of  a  brain  ;  and  know  that  it  has  verily,  though 
deep  beyond  his  soundings,  a  Just  Law  ;  that  the  soul  of 
it  is  good ; — that  his  part  in  it  is  to  conform  to  the  Law 
of  the  Whole,  and  in  devout  silence  follow  that,  not  ques- 
-X  tioning  it,  obeying  it  as  unquestionable."  * 


7.     Briefly  reviewing  the  argument,  we  mark  first, 


*  Advice,  by  the  way,  which  in  these  latter  days  the  giver  might  prop 
erly  enough  take  home  to  himself. 


SUPREMACY   OF   MORAL   REQUIREMENTS.  65 

that  physical  laws  are  characterized  by  constancy  and  uni 
versality,  and  that  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  the  like 
true  of  ethical  ones.  It  is  inferred,  that  if  so,  there  is  no 
safety  but  in  entire  obedience,  even  in  spite  of  threatening 
appearances.  This  inference  is  enforced  by  the  considera 
tion,  that  any  departure  from  principle  to  escape  some 
anticipated  evil,  is  a  return  to  the  proved  errors  of  ex 
pediency.  It  is  again  enforced  by  the  fact,  that  Hhe  in 
numerable  attempts  of  a  stiff-necked  worldly  wisdom 
to  benefit  by  disobedience  have  failed.  And  it  is  yet 
further  enforced  by  the  reflection,  that  to  think  we  can 
better  ourselves  by  deserting  the  road  marked  out  for 
us,  is  an  impious  assumption  of  more  than  divine  omni 
science.  *  ' 


The  reasons  for  thus  specially  insisting  on  implicit 
obedience  will  become  apparent  as  the  reader  proceeds. 
Amongst  the  conclusions  inevitably  following  from  arJF 
admitted  principle,  he  will  most  likely  find  several  for 
which  he  is  hardly  prepared.  Some  of  these  will  seem 
strange  ;  others  impracticable ;  and,  it  may  be — one  or 
two  wholly  at  variance  with  his  ideas  of  duty.  Neverthe 
less  should  he  find  them  logically  derived  from  a  funda 
mental  truth,  he  will  have  no  alternative  but  to  adopt 
them  as  rules  of  conduct,  which  ought  to  be  followed  with 
out  exception.  If  there  be  any  weight  in  the  considera 
tions  above  set  forth,  then,  no  matter  how  seemingly  in 
expedient,  dangerous,  injurious  even,  may  be  the  course 
which  morality  points  out  as  "  abstractedly '  right,"  the 
highest  wisdom  is  in  perfect  and  fearless  submission/*" 


PAET    I. 


CHAPTER    I. 

DEFINITION    OF   MOEALITY. 

§  1.  There  does  not  seem  to  exist  any  settled  idea  as 
to  what  a  Moral  Philosophy  properly  embraces.  Moral 
ists  have  either  omitted  to  prelude  their  inquiries  by 
any  strict  definition  of  the  work  to  be  done,  or  a  defini 
tion  of  a  very  loose  and  indiscriminating  character  has 
been  framed.  Instead  of  confining  themselves  to  the  dis 
covery  and  application  of  certain  essential  principles  of 
right  conduct,  they  have  attempted  to  give  rules  for  all 
possible  actions,  under  all  possible  circumstances.  Prop 
erly  understood  the  subject  matter  for  investigation  lies 
within  comparatively  narrow  limits;  but,  overlooking 
these,  they  have  entered  upon  a  multitude  of  questions 
which  we  shall  shortly  find  to  be  quite  beyond  their 
province. 


2.  As  already  said  (p.  27)  the  moral  law  must  bcf 
the  law  of  the  perfect  man  —  the  law  in  obedience  to  which 
perfection  consists.  There  are  but  two  propositions  for  us 
to  choose  between.  It  may  either  be  asserted  that  moral 
ity  is  a  code  of  rules  for  the  behaviour  of  man  as  he  is  —  a 
code  which  recognizes  existing  defects  of  character,  and 
allows  for  them  ;  or  otherwise  that  it  is  a  code  of  rules  for 
the  regulation  of  conduct  amongst  men  as  they  should  be. 
Of  the  first  alternative  we  must  say,  that  any  proposed 
system  of  morals  which  recognizes  existing  defects,  and 
countenances  acts  made  needful  by  them,  stands  self-con 
demned  ;  seeing  that,  by  the  hypothesis,  acts  thus  excused 


TO  DEFINITION   OF  MORALITY. 

are  not  the  best  conceivable ;  that  is,  are  not  perfectly 
right — not  perfectly  moral,  and  therefore  a  morality  which 
permits  them,  is,  in  so  far  as  it  does  this,  not  a  morality 
at  all.  To  escape  from  this  contradiction  is  impossible, 
save  by  adopting  the  other  alternative ;  namely,  that  the 
moral  law  ignoring  all  vicious  conditions,  defects,  and 
incapacities,  prescribes  the  conduct  of  an  ideal  humanity. 
Pure  and  absolute  rectitude  can  alone  be  its  subject  matter. 
Its  object  must  be  to  determine  the  relationships  in  which 
men  ought  to  stand  to  each  other — to  point  out  the  prin 
ciples  of  action  in  a  normal  society.  By  successive  propo 
sitions  it  must  aim  to  give  a  systematic  statement  of  those 
conditions  under  which  human  beings  may  harmoniously 
combine ;  and  to  this  end  it  requires  as  its  postulate,  that 
those  human  beings  be  perfect.  Or  we  may  term  it  the 
science  of  social  life ;  a  science  that,  in  common  with  all 
other  sciences,  assumes  perfection  in  the  elements  with 
which  it  deals. 

§  3.  Treating  therefore  as  it  does  on  the  abstract 
principles  of  right  conduct,  and  the  deductions  to  be  made 
from  these,  a  system  of  pure  ethics  cannot  recognize  evil, 
or  any  of  those  conditions  which  evil  generates.  It  en 
tirely  ignores  wrong,  injustice,  or  crime,  and  gives  no  in 
formation  as  to  what  must  be  done  when  they  have  been 
committed.  It  knows  no  such  thing  as  an  infraction  of 
the  laws,  for  it  is  merely  a  statement  of  what  the  laws 
are.  It  simply  says,  such  and  such  are  the  principles  on 
which  men  should  act ;  and  when  these  are  broken  it  can 
do  nothing  but  say  that  they  are  broken.  If  asked  what 
ought  any  one  to  do  when  another  has  knocked  him  down, 
it  will  not  tell ;  it  can  only  answer  that  an  assault  is  a 
trespass  against  the  law,  and  gives  rise  to  a  wrong  rela 
tionship.  It  is  silent  as  to  the  manner  in  which  we  should 
'behave  to  a  thief;  all  the  information  it  affords  is,  that 


ITS   LIMITATIONS.  71 

theft  is  a  disturbance  of  social  equilibrium.  We  may 
learn  from  it  that  debt  implies  an  infraction  of  the  moral 
code ;  but  whether  the  debtor  should  or  should  not  be 
imprisoned,  cannot  be  decided  by  it.  To  all  questions 
which  presuppose  some  antecedent  unlawful  action,  such 
as — Should  a  barrister  defend  any  one  whom  he  believes 
to  be  guilty  ?  Ought  a  man  to  break  an  oath  which  he 
has  taken  to  do  something  wrong  ?  Is  it  proper  to  pub 
lish  the  misconduct  of  our  fellows  ?  the  perfect  law  can 
give  no  reply,  because  it  does  not  recognize  the  premises. 
In  seeking  to  settle  such  points  on  purely  ethical  princi 
ples,  moralists  have  attempted  impossibilities.  As  well 
might  they  have  tried  to  solve  mathematically  a  series 
of  problems  respecting  crooked  lines  and  broken-backed 
curves,  or  to  deduce  from  the  theorems  of  mechanics  the 
proper  method  of  setting  to  work  a  dislocated  machine. 
No  conclusions  can  lay  claim  to  absolute  truth,  but  such 
as  depend  upon  truths  that  are  themselves  absolute.  Be 
fore  there  can  be  exactness  in  an  inference,  there  must  be 
exactness  in  the  antecedent  propositions.  A  geometri 
cian  requires  that  the  straight  lines  with  which  he  deals 
shall  be  veritably  straight ;  and  that  his  circles,  and 
ellipses,  and  parabolas  shall  agree  with  precise'definitions 
— shall  perfectly  and  invariably  answer  to  specified  equa 
tions.  If  you  put  to  him  a  question  in  which  these  condi 
tions  are  not  complied  with,  he  tells  you  that  it  cannot 
be  answered.  So  likewise  is  it  with  the  philosophical 
moralist.  He  treats  solely  of  the  straight  man.  He 
determines  the  properties  of  the  straight  man ;  describes 
how  the  straight  man  comports  himself;  shows  in  what 
relationship  he  stands  to  other  straight  men ;  shows  how 
a  community  of  straight  men  is  constituted.  Any  devia 
tion  from  strict  rectitude  he  is  obliged  wholly  to  ignore. 
It  cannot  be  admitted  into  his  premises  without  vitiating 
all  his  conclusions.  A  problem  in  which  a  crooked  man 


72  DEFINITION   OF   MORALITY. 

forms  one  of  tlie  elements  is  insoluble  by  liim.  •  He  may 
state  what  he  thinks  about  it — may  give  an  approximate 
solution ;  but  any  thing  more  is  impossible.  His  decision 
is  no  longer  scientific  and  authoritative,  but  is  now  merely 
an  opinion. 

Or  perhaps  the  point  maybe  most  conveniently  enforced, 
by  using  the  science  of  the  animal  man,  to  illustrate  that 
of  the  moral  man.  Physiology  is  defined  as  a  classified 
statement  of  the  phenomena  of  bodily  life.  It  treats  of 
the  functions  of  our  several  organs  in  their  normal  states. 
It  explains  the  relationships  in  which  the  members  stand 
to  each  other — what  are  their  respective  duties — how 
such  duties  are  performed,  and  why  they  are  necessary. 
It  exhibits  the  mutual .  dependence  of  the  vital  actions ; 
points  out  how  these  are  maintained  in  due  balance,  and 
describes  the  condition  of  things  constituting  perfect 
health.  Disease  it  does  not  even  recognize,  and  can  there 
fore  solve  no  questions  concerning  it.  To  the  inquiry — • 
What  is  the  cause  of  fever  ?  or,  what  is  the  best  remedy 
for  a  cold  ?  it  gives  no  answer.  Such  matters  are  out  of 
its  sphere.  Could  it  reply  it  would  be  no  longer  Physi 
ology,  but  Pathology,  or  Therapeutics.  Just  so  it  is 
with  a  true  morality,  which  might  properly  enough  be 
called — Moral  Physiology.  Its  office  is  simply  to  expound 
the  principles  of  moral  health.  Like  its  analogue,  it  has 
nothing  to  do  with  morbid  actions  and  deranged  func 
tions.  It  deals  only  with  the  laws  of  a  normal  humanity, 
and  cannot  recognize  a  wrong,  a  depraved,  or  a  disordered 
condition. 

Hence  it  appears,  that  in  treating  of  two  such  matters 
as  the  right  of  property,  and  the  impropriety  of  duelling, 
as  parts  of  the  same  science,  moralists  have  confounded 
together  subjects  that  are  essentially  distinct.  The  ques 
tion,  What  are  the  right  principles  of  human  conduct  ? 
is  ,ojie  thing;  the  question,  What  must  be  done  when 


PURE    ETHICS   A   MORAL   PHYSIOLOGY.  73 

those  principles  have  been  broken  through  ?  is  another, 
and  widely-different  thing.  Whether  this  last  admits  of 
any  solution — whether  it  is  possible  to  develop  scientifi 
cally  a  Moral  Pathology  and  a  Moral  Therapeutics  seems 
very  doubtful.  Be  this  as  it  may,  however,  it  is  very  * 
clear  that  a  system  of  pure  Ethics  is  independent  of  these. 
And  it  will  be  considered  so  throughout  the  ensuing  in 
vestigations. 


^   „ 

CHAPTEK    II. 


THE    EVANESCENCE    OF    EVIL. 


§  1.  All  evil  results  from  the  non-adaptation  of  con-' 
stitution  to  conditions.  This  is  true  of  every  thing  that 
lives.  Does  a  shrub  dwindle  in  poor  soil,  or  become  sickly 
when  deprived  of  light,  or  die  outright  if  removed  to  a 
cold  climate?  it  is  because  the  harmony  between  its 
organization  and  its  circumstances  has  been  destroyed. 
Those  experiences  of  the  farmyard  and  the  menagerie 
which  show  that  pain,  disease,  and  death,  are  entailed 
upon  animals  by  certain  kinds  of  treatment,  may  all  be 
generalized  under  the  same  law.  Every  suffering  incident 
to  the  human  body,  from  a  headache  up  to  a  fatal  illness 
— from  a  burn  or  a  sprain,  to  accidental  loss  of  life,  is 
similarly  traceable  to  the  having  placed  that  body  in  a 
situation  for  which  its  powers  did  not  fit  it.  Nor  is  the 
expression  confined  in  its  application  to  physical  evil ;  it 
comprehends  moral  evil  also.  Is  the  kindhearted  man 
distressed  by  the  sight  of  misery  ?  is  the  bachelor  unhappy 
because  his  means  will  not  permit  him  to  marry?  does 
the  mother  mourn  over  her  lost  child  ?  does  the  emigrant 
4 


THE   EVANESCENCE   OF   EVIL. 

lament  leaving  his  father-land  ?  are  some  made  uncomforta 
ble  by  having  to  pass  their  lives  in  distasteful  occupations, 
and  others  from  having  no  occupation  at  all  ?  the  expla 
nation  is  still  the  same.  No  matter  what  the  special  na- 
•ture  of  the  evil,  it  is  invariably  referable  to  the  one  generic 
cause — want  of  congruity  between  the  faculties  and  their 
spheres  of  action. 

. 

§  2.  Equally  true  is  it  that  evil  perpetually  tends  to 
disappear.  In  virtue  of  an  essential  principle  of  life,  this 
non-adaptation  of  an  organism  to  its  conditions  is  ever 
being  rectified ;  and  modification  of  one  or  both,  continues 
until  the  adaptation  is  complete.  Whatever  possesses 
vitality,  from  the  elementary  cell  up  to  man  himself,  in 
clusive,  obeys  this  law.  We  see  it  illustrated  in  the  accli 
matization  of  plants,  in  the  altered  habits  of  domesticated 
animals,  in  the  varying  characteristics  of  our  own  race. 
Accustomed  to  the  brief  arctic  summer,  the  Siberian  herbs 
and  shrubs  spring  up,  flower,  and  ripen  their  seeds,  in  the 
space  of  a  few  weeks.  If  exposed  to  the  rigour  of  north 
ern  winters,  animals  of  the  temperate  zone  get  thicker 
coats,  and  become  white.  The  greyhound  which,  when 
first  transported  to  the  high  plateaus  of  the  Andes,  fails 
in  the  chase  from  want  of  breath,  acquires,  in  the  course 
of  generations,  a  more  efficient  pair  of  lungs.  Cattle 
which  in  their  wild  state  gave  milk  but  for  short  periods, 
now  give  it  almost  continuously.  Ambling  is  a  pace  not 
natural  to  the  horse ;  yet  there  are  American  breeds  that 
now  take  to  it  without  training. 

jyTq-n  exhibits  just  the  same  adaptability.  He  alters  in 
colour  according  to  temperature — lives  here  upon  rice, 
and  there  upon  whale  oil — gets  larger  digestive  organs  if 
he  habitually  eats  innutritions  food — acquires  the  power 
of  long  fasting  if  his  mode  of  life  is  irregular,  and  loses  it 
when  the  supply  of  food  is  certain — becomes  fleet  and 


ADAPTABILITY   OF   MAN   TO   CIRCUMSTANCES. 


Y5 


agile  in  the  wilderness  and  inert  in  the  city — attains  acute 
vision,  hearing,  and  scent,  when  his  habits  of  life  call  for 
them,  and  gets  these  senses  blunted  when  they  are  less 
needful.  That  such  changes  are  toward  fitness  for  sur 
rounding  circumstances  no  one  can  question.  When  he 
sees  that  the  dweller  in  marshes  lives  in  an  atmosphere 
which  is  certain  death  to  a  stranger — when  he  sees  that 
the  Hindoo  can  lie  down  and  sleep  under  a  tropical  sun, 
whilst  his  white  master  with  closed  blinds,  and  water 
sprinklings,  and  punkah,  can  hardly  get  a  doze — when  he 
sees  that  the  Greenlander  and  the  Neapolitan  subsist  com 
fortably  on  their  respective  foods — blubber  and  macaroni, 
but  would  be  made  miserable  by  an  interchange  of  them 
— when  he  sees  that  in  other  cases  there  is  still  this  fit 
ness  to  diet,  to  climate,  and  to  modes  of  life,  even  the 
most  sceptical  must  admit  that  some  law  of  adaptation  is  "" 
at  work.  Nay,  indeed,  if  he  interprets  facts  aright,  he 
will  find  that  the  action  of  such  a  law  is  traceable  down  to 
the  minutest  ramifications  of  individual  experience.  In  the 
drunkard  who  needs  an  increasing  quantity  of  spirits  to 
intoxicate  him,  and  in  the  opium  eater,  who  has  to  keep 
taking  a  larger  dose  to  produce  the  usual  effect,  he  may 
mark  how  the  system  gradually  acquires  power  to  resist 
what  is  noxious.  Those  who  smoke,  who  take  snuff,  or 
who  habitually  use  medicines,  can  furnish  like  illustra 
tions.  Nor,  in  fact,  is  there  any  permanent  change  of 
bodily  state  or  capability,  which  is  not  to  be  accounted 
for  the  same  principle. 

This  universal  law  of  physical  modification,  is  the  law  — ~" 
of  mental  modification  also.    The  multitudinous  differences 
of  capacity  and  disposition  that  have  in  course  of  time 
grown  up   between  the  Indian,  African,  Mongolian 
Caucasian  races,  and  between  the  various  subdivisions  of 
them,  must  all  be  ascribed  to  the  acquirement  in  each 
case   of   fitness   for   surrounding   circumstances.      Those 


76  THE   EVANESCENCE   OF   EVIL. 

strong  contrasts  between  the  characters  of  nations  and 
of  times  awhile  since  exemplified  (p.  47)  admit  of  no 
other  conceivable  explanation.  Why  all  this  diverg 
ence  from  the  one  common  original  type?  If  adapta 
tion  of  constitution  to  conditions  is  not  the  cause,  what  is 
the  cause  ? 

There  are  none,  however,  who  can  with  any  thing  like 
consistency  combat  this  doctrine ;  for  all  use  arguments 
that  presuppose  its  truth.  Even  those  to  whose  prejudices 
the  theory  of  man's  indefinite  adaptability  is  most  op 
posed,  are  continually  betraying  their  involuntary  belief 
in  it.  They  do  this  when  they  attribute  differences  of 
national  character  to  differences  in  social  customs  and 
arrangements:  and  again  when  they  comment  on  the 
force  of  habit:  and  again  when  they  discuss  the  probable 
influence  of  a  proposed  measure  upon  public  morality :  and 
again  when  they  recommend  practice  as  a  means  of  acquir 
ing  increased  aptitude:  and  again  when  they  describe 
certain  pursuits  as  elevating  and  others  as  degrading :  and 
again  when  they  talk  of  getting  used  to  any  thing :  and 
again  when  they  advocate  certain  systems  of  mental  disci 
pline — when  they  teach  that  virtuous  conduct  eventually 
becomes  pleasurable,  and  when  they  warn  against  the 
power  of  a  long-encouraged  vice. 

In  fact,  if  we  consider  the  question  closely,  no  other 
arrangement  of  things  can  be  imagined.  For  we  must 
adopt  one  of  three  propositions.  We  must  either  affirm 
that  the  human  being  is  wholly  unaltered  by  the  influ 
ences  that  are  brought  to  bear  upon  him — his  circum 
stances  as  we  call  them ;  or  that  he  perpetually  tends 
to  become  more  and  more  imfitted  to  those  circum 
stances  ;  or  that  he  tends  to  become  fitted  to  them.  If 
the  first  is  true,  then  all  schemes  of  education,  of  govern 
ment,  of  social  reform — all  instrumentalities  by  which  it  is 
proposed  to  act  upon  man,  are  utterly  useless,  seeing  that 


MENTAL   AND   SOCIAL   MODIFIABILITY   OF  MAN.          77 

he  cannot  be  acted  upon  at  all.  If  the  second  is  true,  then 
the  way  to  make  a  man  virtuous  is  to  accustom  him  to 
vicious  practices,  and  vice  versd.  Both  of  which  prop 
ositions  being  absurd,  we  are  compelled  to  admit  the  re- 


§  3.  Keeping  in  mind  then  the  two  facts,  that  all 
evil  results  from  the  non-adaptation  of  constitution  to 
conditions;  and  that  where  this  non-adaptation  exists 
it  is  continually  being  diminished  by  the  changing  of 
constitution  to  suit  conditions,  we  shall  be  prepared  for 
comprehending  the  present  position  of  the  human  race. 

By  the  increase  of  population  the  state  of  existence  we  / 
call  social  has  been  necessitated.     Men  living  in  this  state 
suffer  under  numerous  evils.     By  the  hypothesis  it  follows 
that  their  characters  are  not  completely  adapted  to  such  a  / 
state. 

In  what  respect  are  they  not  so    adapted?  what  is 
the  special  qualification  which  the  social  state  requires  ? 

It  requires  that  each  individual  shall  have  such  desires  • 
only,  as  may  be  fully  satisfied  without  trenching  upon  the 
ability  of  other  individuals  to  obtain  like  satisfaction.  If 
the  desires  of  each  are  not  thus  limited,  then  either  all 
must  have  certain  of  their  desires  ungratified ;  or  some 
must  get  gratification  for  them  at  the  corresponding  ex 
pense  of  others.  Both  of  which  alternatives  necessitating 
pain,  imply  non-adaptation. 

But  why  is  not  man  adapted  to  the  social  state  ?~""* 

Simply  because  he  yet  partially  retains  the  characteris 
tics  that  adapted  him  for  an  antecedent  state.  The  re-  - 
spects  in  which  he  is  not  fitted  to  society  are  the  respects 
in  which  he  is  fitted  for  his  original  predatory  life.  His 
primitive  circumstances  required  that  he  should  sacrifice 
the  welfare  of  other  beings  to  his  own ;  his  present  cir 
cumstances  require  that  he  should  not  do  so ;  and  in  as 


<°  THE   EVANESCENCE   OF   EVIL. 

far  as  his  old  attribute  still  clings-  to  him,  in  so  far  is  he 
unfit  for  the  social  state.  All  sins  of  men  against  each 
other,  from  the  cannibalism  of  the  Carrib  to  the  crimes 
and  venalities  that  we  see  around  us  ;  the  felonies  that  fill 
our  prisons,  the  trickeries  of  trade,  the  quarrelings  of  na 
tion  with  nation,  and  01  class  with  class,  the  corruptness 
of  institutions,  the  jealousies  of  caste,  and  the  scandal  of 
drawing-rooms,  have  their  causes  comprehended  under 
this  generalization. 

Concerning  the  present  position  of  the  human  race, 
we  must  therefore  say,  that  man  needed  one  moral  consti 
tution  to  fit  him  for  his  original  state ;  that  he  needs 
another  to  fit  him  for  his  present  statev;  and  that  he  has 
been,  is,  and  will  long  continue  to  be,  in  process  of  adap 
tation.  By  the  term  civilization  we  signify  the  adap 
tation  that  has  already  taken  place.  The  changes  that 
constitute  progress  are  the  successive  steps  of  the  transi 
tion.  And  the  belief  in  human  perfectibility,  merely 
amounts  to  the  belief,  that  in  virtue  of  this  process,  man 
will  eventually  become  completely  suited  to  his  mode 
of  life. 

§  4.  If  there  be  any  collusiveness  in  the  foregoing 
arguments,  such  a  faith  is  well  founded.  As  commonly 
supported  by  evidence  drawn  from  history,  it  cannot  be 
considered  indisputable.  The  inference  that  as  advance 
ment  has  been  hitherto  the  rule,  it  will  be  the  rule  hence 
forth,  may  be  called  a  plausible  speculation.  But  when  it 
is  shown  that  this  advancement  is  due  to  the  working  of 
a  universal  law ;  and  that  in  virtue  of  that  law  it  must 
continue  until  the  state  we  call  perfection  is  reached,  then 
the  advent  of  such  a  state  is  removed  out  of  the  region  of 
probability  into  that  of  certainty.  If  any  one  demurs  to 
this,  let  him  point  out  the  error.  Here  are  the  several 
steps  of  the  argument. 


REASON  AND  NECESSITY   OF   PEOGEESS.  79 

All  imperfection  is  unfitness  to  the  conditions  of  ex 
istence. 

This  unfitness  must  consist  either  in  having  a  faculty 
or  faculties  in  excess ;  or  in  having  a  faculty  or  faculties 
deficient ;  or  in  both. 

A  feculty  in  excess,  is  one  which  the  conditions  of  ex 
istence  do  not  afford  full  exercise  to ;  and  a  faculty  that  is 
deficient,  is  one  from  which  the  conditions  of  existence 
demand  more  than  it  can  perform. 

But  it  is  an  essential  principle  of  life  that  a  faculty  to 
which  circumstances  do  not  allow  full  exercise  diminishes ; 
and  that  a  faculty  on  which  circumstances  make  excessive 
demands  increases. 

And  so  long  as  this  excess  and  this  deficiency  continue, 
there  must  continue  decrease  on  the  one  hand,  and  growth 
on  the  other. 

Finally,  all  excess  and  all  deficiency  must  disappear ; « 
that  is,  all  unfitness  must  disappear ;  that  is,  all  imperfec 
tion  must  disappear. 

Thus  the  ultimate  development  of  the  ideal  man  is 
logically  certain — as  certain  as  any  conclusion  in  which 
we  place  the  most  implicit  faith ;  for  instance,  that  all 
men  will  die.  For  why  do  we  infer  that  all  men  will  die? 
Simply  because,  in  an  immense  number  of  past  experiences, 
death  has  uniformly  occurred.  Similarly  then  as  the 
experiences  of  all  people  in  all  times — experiences  that  are 
embodied  in  maxims,  proverbs,  and  moral  precepts,  and 
that  are  illustrated  in  biographies  and  histories,  go  to 
prove  that  organs,  faculties,  powers,  capacities,  or  what 
ever  else  we  call  them,  grow  by  use  and  diminish  from 
disuse,  it  is  inferred  that  they  will  continue  to  do  so. 
And  if  this  inference  is  unquestionable,  then  is  the  one 
above  deduced  from  it — that  humanity  must  in  the  end 
become  completely  adapted  to  its  conditions — unquestion 
able  also. 


80  THE   EVANESCENCE   OF   EVIL. 

Progress,  therefore,  is  not  an  accident,  but  a  necessity. 
Instead  of  civilization  being  artificial,  it  is  a  part  of  na 
ture  ;  all  of  a  piece  with  the  development  of  the  embryo 
or  the  unfolding  of  a  flower.  The  modifications  mankind 
have  undergone,  and  are  still  undergoing,  result  from  a 
law  underlying  the  whole  organic  creation ;  and  provided 
the  human  race  continues,  and  the  constitution  of  things 
remains  the  same,  those  modifications  must  end  in  com 
pleteness.  As  surely  as  the  tree  becomes  bulky  when  it 
stands  alone,  and  slender  if  one  of  a  group ;  as  surely  as 
the  same  creature  assumes  the  different  forms  of  cart-horse 
and  race-horse,  according  as  its  habits  demand  strength 
;or  speed;  as  surely  as  a  blacksmith's  arm  grows  large, 
and  the  skin  of  a  labourer's  hand  thick ;  as  surely  as  the 
eye  tends  to  become  long-sighted  in  the  sailor,  and  short 
sighted  in  the  student ;  as  surely  as  the  blind  attain  a  more 
delicate  sense  of  touch ;  as  surely  as  a  clerk  acquires  rapidity 
in  writing  and  calculation ;  as  surely  as  the  musician  learns 
to  detect  an  error  of  a  semitone  amidst  what  seems  to 
others  a  very  babel  of  sounds ;  as  surely  as  a  passion 
grows  by  indulgence  and  diminishes  when  restrained ;  as 
surely  as  a  disregarded  conscience  becomes  inert,  and  one 
that  is  obeyed  active  ;  as  surely  as  there  is  any  efficacy  in 
educational  culture,  or  any  meaning  in  such  terms  as  habit, 
custom,  practice ;  so  surely  must  the  human  faculties  be 
moulded  into  complete  fitness  for  the  social  state ;  so  surely 
must  the  things  we  call  evil  and  immorality  disappear ;  so 
surely  must  man  become  perfect. 


• 


THE   CREATIVE   PUKPOSE.  81 


CHAPTEK    III. 

THE   DIVINE   IDEA,    AND   THE    CONDITIONS    OF   ITS 
REALIZATION. 

§  1.  If,  instead  of  proposing  it  as  the  rule  of  human 
conduct,  Bentham  had  simply  assumed  "  greatest  happi 
ness  "  to  be  the  creative  purpose,  his  position  would  have 
been  tenable  enough.  Almost  all  men  do  in  one  way  or 
other  assert  the  same.  There  have  indeed  been  times 
when  such  a  faith  was  far  from  universal.  Had  the 
proposition  been  made  before  Simeon  Stylites  on  the  top 
of  his  column,  he  would  very  likely  have  demurred  to  it. 
Probably  the  Flagellants  of  the  thirteenth  century  may 
have  thought  otherwise.  And  even  now  it  is  possible 
that  the  Fakeers  of  India  hold  a  contrary  opinion.  But, 
whilst  it  may  be  true  that  a  savage  asceticism  attributes 
to  the  Deity  a  barbarity  equal  to  its  own,  and  conceives 
him  as  delighting  in  human  sacrifices ;  whilst  it  may  be 
true  that  amongst  ourselves  the  same  notion  yet  lingers, 
under  the  form  of  occasional  fasts  and  penances;  still 
there  are  few  if  any  amongst  civilized  people  who  do 
not  agree  that  human  well-being  is  in  accordance  with 
the  Divine  will.  The  doctrine  is  taught  by  all  Qur 
religious  teachers;  it  is  assumed  by  every  writer  on 
morality:  we  may  therefore  safely  consider  it  as  an 
admitted  truth. 

It  is  one  thing,  however,  to  hold  that  greatest  happi 
ness  is  the  creative  purpose,  and  a  quite  different  thing  to 
hold  that  greatest  happiness  should  be  the  immediate 
.aimjrf  man.  It  has  been  the  fatal  error  of  the  expedi 
ency-philosophers  to  confound  these  positions.  They  have 
not  observed  that  the  truth  has  two  sides,  a  Divine  side 
4* 


82      THE  DIVINE  IDEA CONDITIONS  OF  ITS  REALIZATION. 

and  a  human  side ;  and  that  it  matters  much  to  us  which 
we  look  at.  Greatest  Happiness  and  Morality,  are  the 
face  and  obverse  of  the  same  fact :  what  is  written  on  the 
one  surface  is  beyond  our  interpretation :  what  is  written 
on  the  other  we  may  read  easily  enough. 

Or  dropping  metaphor,  and  speaking  in  philosophical 
language,  we  may  say  that  it  is  for  us  to  ascertain  the 
conditions  by  conforming  to  which  this  greatest  happiness 
may  be  attained.  Not  to  put  trust  in  guesses :  not  to  do 
this  or  that,  because  we  think  it  will  be  beneficial :  but  to 
find  out  what  really  is  the  line  of  conduct  that  leads  to 
the  desired  end.  For  unquestionably  there  must  be  in 
the  nature  of  things  some  definite  and  fixed  pre-requisites 
to  success.  Man  is  a  visible,  tangible  entity,  having  prop 
erties.  In  the  circumstances  that  surround  him  there  are 
certain  unchanging  necessities.  Life  is  dependent  upon 
the  fulfilment  of  specific  functions;  and  happiness  is  a 
particular  kind  of  life.  Surely  then  if  we  would  know 
how,  in  the  midst  of  these  appointed  circumstances,  the 
being  Man  must  live,  so  as  to  achieve  the  result — greatest 
happiness,  we  ought  first  to  determine  what  the  essential 
conditions  are.  If  we  solve  the  problem,  it  can  only  be 
by  consulting  these  and  submitting  ourselves  to  them. 
To  suppose  that  we  may,  in  ignorance  or  disregard 
of  them,  succeed  by  some  hap-hazard  speculation,  is 
sheer  folly.  Only  in  one  way  can  the  desideratum  be 
reached.  What  that  one  way  is  must  depend  upon  the 
fundamental  necessities  of  our  position.  And  if  we  would 
discover  it,  our  first  step  must  be  to  ascertain  those 
necessities. 


§  2.  At  the  head  of  them  stands  this  unalterable 
fact — the  social  state.  In  the  preordained  course  of 
things,  men  have  multiplied  until  they  are  constrained  to 
live  more  or  less  in  presence  of  each  other.  That,  as 


SOCIAL   LIMIT  OF  INDIVIDUAL   ACTION.  83 

being  needful  for  the  support  of  the  greatest  sum  of  life, 
such  a  condition  is  preliminary  to  the  production  of  the 
greatest  sum  of  happiness,  seems  highly  probable.  Be 
that  as  it  may,  however,  we  find  this  state  established ; 
are  henceforth  to  continue  in  it ;  and  must  therefore  set  it 
down  as  one  of  those  necessities  which  our  rules  for  the 
achievement  of  the  greatest  happiness  must  recognize  and 
conform  to. 

In  this  social  state  the  sphere  of  activity  of  each  indi- 
vidual  being  limited  by  the  spheres  of  activity  of  other 
individuals,  it  follows  that  the  men  who  are  to  realize 
this  greatest  sum  of  happiness,  must  be  men  of  whom  each 
can  obtain  complete  happiness  within  his  own  sphere  of 
activity,  without  diminishing  the  spheres  of  activity  re 
quired  for  the  acquisition  of  happiness  by  others.  For 
manifestly,  if  each  or  any  of  them  cannot  receive  complete 
happiness  without  lessening  the  spheres  of  activity  of  one 
or  more  of  the  rest,  he  must  either  himself  come  short  of 
complete  happiness,  or  must  make  one  or  more  do  so  ;  and 
hence  under  such  circumstances,  the  sum  total  of  happi 
ness  cannot  be  as  great  as  is  conceivable,  or  cannot  be 
greatest  happiness.  Here  then  is  the  first  of  those  fixed 
conditions  to  the  obtainment  of  greatest  happiness,  necessi 
tated  by  the  social  state.  It  is  the  fulfilment  of  this  con 
dition  which  we  express  by  the  word  justice. 

To  this  all-essential  prerequisite  there  is  a  supplement- 
ary  one  of  kindred  nature.  We  find  that  without  trench 
ing  upon  each  other's  spheres  of  activity,  men  may  yet 
behave  to  one  another  in  such  a  way  as  to  produce  pain 
ful  emotions.  And  if  any  have  feelings  that  lead  them  to 
do  this,  it  is  clear  that  the  total  amount  of  happiness  is 
not  so  great  as  it  would  be  were  they  devoid  of  those 
feelings.  Hence,  to  compass  greatest  happiness,  the  hu 
man  constitution  must  be  such  as  that  each  man  may  per 
fectly  fulfil  his  own  nature,  not  only  without  diminishing 


84      THE  DIVINE  IDEA — CONDITIONS  OF  ITS  REALIZATION. 

other  men's  spheres  of  activity,  but  without  giving  un- 
happiness  to  other  men  in  any  direct  or  indirect  way. 
This  condition,  as  we  shall  by-and-by  see,  needs  to  be  kept 
quite  distinct  from  the  foregoing  one.  The  observance  of 
it  may  be  called  negative  beneficence. 

Yet  another  requirement  is  there  by  fulfilment  of 
which  the  happiness  flowing  from  compliance  with  the 
foregoing  ones  is  indefinitely  multiplied.  Let  a  race  of 
beings  be  so  constituted  as  that  each  individual  may  be 
able  to  obtain  full  satisfaction  for  all  his  desires,  without 
deducting  from  the  satisfaction  obtainable  by  other  indi 
viduals,  and  we  have  a  state  of  things  in  which  the 
amount  of  isolated  happiness  is  the  greatest  conceivable. 
But  let  these  beings  be  so  constituted  as  that  each,  in 
addition  to  the  pleasurable  emotions  personally  received 
by  him,  can  sympathetically  participate  in  the  pleasurable 
emotions  of  all  others,  and  the  sum-total  of  happiness 
becomes  largely  increased.  Hence,  to  the  primary  re 
quisite  that  each  shall  be  able  to  get  complete  happiness 
without  diminishing  the  happiness  of  the  rest,  we  must 
now  add  the  secondary  one  that  each  shall  be  capable 
of  receiving  happiness  from  the  happiness  of  the  rest. 
Compliance  with  this  requisite  implies  positive  benefi 
cence. 

Lastly,  there  must  go  to  the  production  of  the  greatest 
happiness  the  further  condition,  that,  whilst  duly  regard 
ful  of  the  preceding  limitations,  each  individual  shall  per 
form  all  those  acts  required  to  fill  up  the  measure  of  his 
own  private  happiness. 

These,  then,  are  necessities.  They  are  not  matters  of 
opinion,  but  matters  of  unalterable  fact.  Denial  of  them 
is  impossible,  for  nothing  else  can  be  stated  but  what 
is  self-contradictory.  Without  any  alternative,  beings 
who  are  to  realize  the  Divine  Idea  must  be  thus  consti 
tuted.  Before  greatest  happiness  can  be  brought  about, 


MOULDING   OF    CHARACTER.  85 

every  man  must  answer  to  these  definitions ;  and  all  ap 
proach  to  greatest  happiness,  presupposes  an  approach 
toward  conformity  with  them.  Schemes  of  government 
and  culture  which  ignore  them,  cannot  but  be  essentially 
absurd.  Every  thing  must  be  good  or  bad,  right  or 
wrong,  in  virtue  of  its  accordance  or  discordance  with 
them.  We  have  no  need  to  perplex  ourselves  with  investi 
gations  into  the  expediency  of  every  measure,  by  trying 
to  trace  out  its  ultimate  results  in  all  their  infinite  ramifi 
cations — a  task  which  it  is  folly  to  attempt.  Our  course 
is  to  inquire  concerning  such  measure,  whether  or  not  it 
fully  recognizes  these  fundamental  necessities,  and  to  be 
sure  that  it  must  be  proper  or  improper  accordingly. 
Our  whole  code  of  duty  is  comprehended  in  the  endeavour 
to  live  up  to  these  necessities.  If  we  find  pleasure  in 
doing  this,  it  is  well ;  if  not,  our  aim  must  be  to  acquire 
that  pleasure.  Greatest  happiness  is  obtained  only  when 
conformity  to  them  is  spontaneous ;  seeing  that  the  re 
straint  of  desires  inciting  to  trespass  implies  pain,  or  de 
duction  from  greatest  happiness.  Hence  it  is  for  us  to 
habituate  ourselves  to  fulfil  these  requirements  as  fast  as 
we  can.  The  social  state  is  a  necessity.  The  conditions 
of  greatest  happiness  under  that  state  are  fixed.  Our 
characters  are  the  only  things  not  fixed.  They,  then, 
must  be  moulded  into  fitness  for  the  conditions.  And  all 
moral  teaching  and  discipline  must  have  for  its  object,  to 
hasten  this  process. 

§  3.  Objection  may  be  taken  to  the  foregoing  classi 
fication  of  the  conditions  needful  to  greatest  happiness,  as 
being  in  some  degree  artificial.  It  will  perhaps  be  said 
that  the  distinction  between  justice  and  beneficence  can 
not  be  maintained,  for  that  the  two  graduate  into  each 
other  imperceptibly.  Some  may  argue  that  it  is  not 
allowable  to  assume  any  essential  difference  between 


86      THE  DIVINE  IDEA CONDITIONS  OF  ITS  REALIZATION. 

right  conduct  toward  others  and  right  conduct  toward 
self,  seeing  that  what  are  generally  considered  purely 
private  actions,  do  eventually  affect  others  to  such  a  de 
gree,  as  to  render  them  public  actions;  as  witness  the 
collateral  effects  of  drunkenness  or  suicide.  Others  again 
may  contend  that  all  morality  should  be  classed  as  pri 
vate  ;  because  with  the  rightly-constituted  or  moral  man, 
correct  conduct  to  others  is  merely  incidental  upon  the 
fulfilment  of  his  own  nature. 

In  each  of  these  allegations  there  is  much  truth ;  and 
it  is  not  to  be  denied  that  under  a  final  analysis,  all  such 
distinctions  as  those  above  made  must  disappear.  But  it 
should  be  borne  in  mind  that  similar  criticisms  may  be 
passed  upon  all  classifications  whatever.  It  might  after 
the  same  fashion  be  argued  that  we  ought  not  to  separate 
the  laws  of  heat  from  those  of  mechanics,  because  fire 
when  applied  to  water  generates  mechanical  force.  On 
like  grounds  Optics  ought  to  be  identified  with  Chemis 
try;  seeing  that  in  the  photographic  process,  light  be 
comes  a  chemical  agent.  Considering  that  muscles  con 
tract  when  stimulated  by  a  galvanic  current,  we  ought  to 
treat  of  Physiology  and  Electricity  as  forming  one  science. 
Nor  should  we  even  distinguish  between  vegetable  and 
animal  life ;  for  these  are  found  to  have  a  common  root, 
and  it  is  hardly  possible  to  say  of  the  lowest  organisms 
which  division  they  belong  to.  So  that  unless  such 
objectors  are  prepared  to  say  that  Botany  and  Zoology 
should  be  regarded  as  one,  and  that  all  lines  of  demarca 
tion  between  the  physical  sciences  should  be  abolished, 
they  must  in  consistency  tolerate  an  analogous  classifica 
tion  in  moral  science ;  and  must  admit  that  whilst  this  is 
in  a  certain  sense  artificial,  it  may  be  an  essential  prelimi 
nary  to  any  thing  like  systematic  investigation.  The  same 
finite  power  of  comprehension  which  compels  us  to  deal 
with  natural  phenomena  by  separating  them  into  groups 


OFFICE    OF    SCIENTIFIC   MORALITY.  87 

and  studying  each  group  by  itself,  may  also  compel  us  to 
separate  those  actions  which  place  a  man  in  direct  relation 
ship  with  his  fellows,  from  others  which  do  not  so  place 
him ;  although  it  may  be  true  that  such  a  separation  can 
not  be  strictly  maintained.  And  even  in  dealing  with  one 
of  these  sections — in  developing  the  principles  of  right 
conduct  to  others,  it  may  be  further  necessary  to  distin 
guish,  as  above,  the  primary  and  most  imperative  princi 
ple,  from  the  secondary  and  less  imperative  one ;  notwith 
standing  that  these  have  a  common  root. 

§   4.     The  realization  of  the  Divine  Idea  being  re-   «— - 
duced  to  the  fulfilment  of  certain  conditions,  it  becomes 
the  office  of  a  scientific  morality,  to  make  a  detailed  state 
ment  of  the  mode  in  which  life  must  be  regulated  so  as  tq^ 
conform  to  them.      On  each  of  these  axiomatic  truths  it 
must  be  possible  to  build  a  series  of  theorems  immediately 
bearing  upon  our  daily  conduct ;  or,  inverting  the  thought 
— every  act    stands   in   a   certain    relationship   to   these 
truths,  and  it  must  be  possible  in  some  way  or  other  to 
solve  the  problem,  whether  that  relationship  is  one  of 
accordance  or  discordance.      When  such  a  series  of  theo 
rems  has  been  elaborated,  and  solutions  have  been  given 
to  such  a  series  of  problems,  the  task  of  the  moralist  v&s/ 
accomplished. 

Each  of  these  axioms,  however,  may  have  its  own  set 
of  consequences  separately  deduced,  or  indeed,  as  already 
hinted,  must  have  them  so  deduced.  Their  respective 
developments  constitute  independent  departments  of  moral 
science,  requiring  to  be  dealt  with  in  the  order  of  their 
natural  sequence.  For  the  present,  therefore,  our  atten 
tion  will  be  confined  to  the  first  and  most  essential  of 
them.  Individual  or  private  morality,  as  distinguished 
from  social  or  public  morality,  is  not  to  be  entered  upon 
in  the  following  pages.  Neither  will  there  be  found  in 


00      THE  DIVINE  IDEA CONDITIONS  OF  ITS  REALIZATION. 

them  any  statement  of  that  class  of  moral  obligations 
above  comprehended  under  the  terms  positive  and  nega 
tive  beneficence.*  It  is  with  the  several  inferences  to  be 
drawn  from  that  primary  condition  to  greatest  happiness, 
the  observance  of  which  is  vaguely  signified  by  the  word 
justice,  that  we  have  now  to  deal.  Our  work  will  be  to 
unfold  that  condition  into  a  system  of  equity ;  to  mark 
out  those  limits  put  to  each  man's  proper  sphere  of  activity, 
by  the  like  spheres  of  other  men  ;  to  delineate  the  relation 
ships  that  are  necessitated  by  a  recognition  of  those 
limits ;  or — in  other  words — to  develop  the  principles  of 
Social  Statics. 

*  These  other  divisions  of  the  subject  may  be  taken  up  on  a  future 
occasion,  should  circumstances  favour. 


PAET   II. 


CIIAPTEE   IY. 

DERIVATION    OF   A   FIRST   PRINCIPLE. 

§  1.  Tliere_jvill_j3()ssilbl^  be_  some  for 
d  priori  considerations  set  forth  in  the  foregoing  chapter, 
are  too  abstract  for  distinct  comprehension.  It  is  easy, 
however,  to  reason  our  way  to  that  iirst  principle  of  ethi 
cal  science  which  we  are  about  to  follow  out  to  its  conse 
quences,  without  any  appeal  to  these.  And  it  will  be 
desirable  now  to  do  this.  Starting  afresh,  then,  from 
the  admitted  truth,  that  human  happiness  is  the  Divine 
will^&t  us  look  at  the  means  appointed  for  the  obtainment 
of  that'  happiness,  and  observe  what  conditions  they  pre- 
suppose. 

Happiness  is  a  certain  state  of  consciousness.  That 
state/must  be  produced  by  the  action  upon  consciousness 
of  certain  modifying  influences — by  certain  affections  of  it. 
All  affections  of  consciousness ^we  term  sensations.  And 
amongst  the  rest,  those  affections  of  it  which  constitute 
happiness  must  be  sensations. 

But  how  do  we  receive  sensations  ?  Through  what 
are  called  faculties.  It  is  certain  that  a  man  cannot 
see  without  eyes.  Equally  certain  is  it  that  he  can 
experience  no  impression  of  any  kind,  unless  he  is  en 
dowed  with  some  power  fitted  to  take  in  tha't  impres 
sion  ;  that  is,  a  faculty.  All  the  mental  states  which 
he  calls  feelings  and  ideas,  are  affections  of  his  con 
sciousness  received  through  the  faculties — sensations  giv 
en  to  it  by  them. 

There  next  comes  the  question — under  wThat  circum- 


92  DERIVATION   OF  A   FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

stances  do  the  faculties  yield  those  sensations  of  which 
happiness  consists  ?  The  reply  is — when  .they  are  exer 
cised.  It  is  from  the  activity  of  one  or  more  of  them 
that  all  gratification  arises.  To  the  healthful  performance 
of  each  function  of  mind  or  body  attaches  a  pleasurable 
feeling.  And  this  pleasurable  feeling  is  obtainable  only 
by  the  performance  of  the  function ;  that  is,  by  the  exer 
cise  of  the  correlative  faculty.  Every  faculty  in  turn 
affords  its  special  emotion ;  and  the  sum  of  these  consti 
tutes  happiness. 

Or  the  matter  may  be  briefly  put  thus :  (A  desire  is 
the  need  for  some  species  of  sensation.  A  sensation  is 
producible  only  by  the  exercise  of  a  faculty.  Hence  no 
desire  can  be  satisfied  except  through  the  exercise  of  a 
faculty.  But  happiness  consists  in  the  due  satisfaction  of 
all  the  desires  ;  that  is,Jiappiness  consists  in  the  due  exer 
cise  of  all  the  faculties./ 

§  2.  Now  if  God  wills  man's  happiness,  and  man's 
happiness  can  be  obtained  only  by  the  exercise  of  his 
faculties,  then  God  wills  that  man  should  exercise  his 
faculties  ;  that  is,  it  is  man's  duty  to  exercise  his  faculties ; 
for  duty  means  fulfilment  of  the  Divine  will.  That  it  is 
man's  duty  to  exercise  his  faculties  is  further  proved  by 
the  fact,  that  what  we  call  punishment  attaches  to  the 
neglect  of  that  exercise.  Not  only  is  the  normal  activity 
of  each  faculty  productive  of  pleasure,  but  the  continued 
suspension  of  that  activity  is  productive  of  pain.  As  the 
stomach  hungers  to  digest  food,  so  does  every  bodily  and 
mental  a^ent  hunger  to  perform  its  appointed  action. 
And  as  the  refusal  to  satisfy  the  cravings  of  the  digestive 
faculty  is  productive  of  suffering,  so  is  the  refusal  to 
satisfy  the  cravings  of  any  other  faculty  also  productive 
of  suffering,  to  an  extent  proportionate  to  the  import 
ance  of  that  faculty.  But  as  God  wills  man's  happi- 


THE   EIGHT   TO   FREEDOM   OF   ACTION.  93 

ness,  that  line  of  conduct  which  produces  unhappiness 
is  contrary  to  his  will.  Therefore  the  non-exercise  of  the 
faculties  is  contrary  to  his  will.  Either  way,  then,  we 
find  thatxtie  exercise  of  the  faculties  is  God's  will  and 
man's^uty.  *>~ 

'But  the  fulfilment  of  this  duty  necessarily  presupposes 
freedom  of  action.  Man  cannot  exercise  his  faculties 
without  certain  scope.  ^He  must  have  liberty  to  go  and 
to  come,  to  see,  to  feel,  to  speak,  to  work ;  to  get  food, 
raiment,  shelter,  and  to  provide  for  each  and  all  of  the 
needs  of  his  nature.^He  must  be  free  to  do  every  thing 
which  is  directly  or  indirectly  requisite  for  $he  due  satis 
faction  of  every  mental  and  bodily  want.  ''Without  this 
he  cannot  fulfil  his  duty  or  God's  will. /But  if  he  Cannot 
fulfil  Goal's  will  without  it,  then  God  commands  him  to 
take  it.  AJHe  has  Divine  authority,  therefore,  for  claiming 
this  freedom  of  action.  God  intended  him  to  have  it ; 
that  is,  he  has  a  right  to  it^ 

From  this  conclusion  there  seems  no  possibility  of 
escape.  Let  us  repeat  the  steps  by  which  we  arrive  at 
it.  jLGod  wills  man's  happiness.  Man's  happiness  can 
only*t)e  produced  by  the  exercise  of  his  faculties.  Then 
God  wills  that  he  should  exercise  his  faculties.  But  to 
exercise  his  faculties  he  must  have  liberty  to  do  all  that 
his  faculties  naturally  impel  him  to  do.  Then  God  intends 
he  should  Jiave  that  liberty.  Therefore  he  has  a  right  to 
that  liberty.y 

§  3.  This  however,  is  not  the  right  of  one  but  of 
all.  All  are  endowed  with  faculties.  All  are  bound  to 
fulfil  the  Divine  will  by  exercising  them.  All  therefore 
must  be  free  to  do  those  things  in  which  the  exercise  of 
them  consists.  That  is,  all  must  have  rights  to  liberty  of 
action. 

And  hence  there  necessarily  arises  a  limitation.     For 


94  DEEIVATION   OF   A   FLKST   PEINCIPLE. 

if  men  have  like  claims  to  that  freedom  which  is  needful 
for  the  exercise  of  their  faculties,  then  must  the  freedom 
of  each  be  bounded  by  the  similar  freedom  of  all.  When, 
in  the  pursuit  of  their  respective  ends,  two  individuals 
clash,  the  movements  of  the  one  remain  free  only  in  so  far 
as  they  do  not  interfere  with  the  like  movements  of  the 
other.  This  sphere  of  existence  into  which  we  are  thrown 
not  affording  room  for  the  unrestrained  activity  of  all, 
and  yet  all  possessing  in  virtue  of  their  constitutions  simi 
lar  claims  to  such  unrestrained  activity,  there  is  no  course 
but  to  apportion  out  the  unavoidable  restraint  equally. 
Wherefore  we  arrive  at  the  general  proposition,  that{every 
man  may  claim  the  fullest  liberty  to  exercise  his  faculties 
compatible  with  the  possession  of  like  liberty  by  every 
other  man. 

*"  §  4.  Upon  a  partial  consideration  this  statement  of 
the  law  will  perhaps  seem  open  to  criticism.  xlt  may  be 
thought  better  to  limit  the  right  of  each  to  exercise  his 
faculties,  by  the  proviso  that  he  shall  not  hurt  any  one 
else — shall  not  inflict  pain  on  any  one  else.  But  although 
at  first  sight  satisfactory,  this  expression  of  the  law  allows 
of  erroneous  deductions,  jj  It  is  true  that  men,  answering 
to  those  conditions  of  greatest  happiness  set  forth  in  the 
foregoing  chapter,  cannot  exercise  their  faculties  to  the 
aggrieving  of  one  another.  It  is  not,  however,  that  each 
avoids  giving  pain  by  refraining  from  the  full  exercise  of 
his  faculties  ;  but  it  is  that  the  faculties  of  each  are  such 
that  the  full  exercise  of  them  offends  no  one.  And  herein 
lies  the  cliiference.  The  giving  of  any  pain  may  have  two 
causes.  Either  th'e  abnormally-constituted  man  may  do 
something  displeasing  to  the  normal  feelings  of  his  neigh 
bours,  in  which  case  he  acts  wrongly ;  or  the'  behaviour 
of  the  normally-constituted  man  may  irritate  the  abnormal 
feelings  of  his  neighbours ;  in  which  case  it  is  not  his 


LIMIT   TO   FREEDOM   OF   ACTION.  95 

behaviour  that  is  wrong,  but  their  characters  that  are 
so.  Under  such  circumstances  the  due  exercise  of  his 
faculties  is  right,  although  it  gives  pain ;  and  the  remedy 
for  the  evil  lies  in  the  modification  of  those  abnormal 
feelings  to  which  pain  is  given.  ? 

To  elucidate  this  distinction  let  us  take  a  few  illustra 
tions.  An  honest  man  discovers  some  friend,  of  whom 
he  had  previously  thought  well,  to  be  a  rogue.  He  has 
certain  high  instincts  to  which  rougery  is  repugnant ;  and 
allowing  free  play  to  these,  he  drops  the  acquaintanceship 
of  this  unworthy  one.  ISTow,  though  in  doing  so  he  gives 
pain,  it  does  not  follow  that  he  transgresses  the  law.  The 
evil  must  be  ascribed,  not  to  an  undue  exercise  of  faculties 
by  him,  but  to  the  immorality  of  the  man  who  suffers. 
Again,  a  Protestant  in  a  Roman  Catholic  country,  refuses^,  /^ 
to  uncover  his  head  on  the  passing  of  the  host.  In  s/*^ 
obeying  the  promptings  of  certain  sentiments,  he  annoys 
the  spectators ;  and  were  the  above  modified  expression 
of  the  law  correct,  would  be  blamable.  The  fault,  how 
ever,  is  not  with  him,  but  with  those  who  are  offended. 
It  is  not  that  he  is  culpable  in  thus  testifying  to  his  belief, 
but  it  is  that  they  ought  not  to  have  so  tyrannical  an  in 
tolerance  of  other  opinions  than  their  own.  Or  again,  a 
son,  to  the  great  displeasure  of  his  father  and  family, 
marries  one  who,  though  in  all  respects  admirable,  is 
dowerless.  In  thus  obeying  the  dictates  of  his  nature  he 
may  entail  considerable  distress  of  mind  upon  his  rela 
tives  ;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  his  conduct  is  bad ;  it 
follows  rather  that  the  feelings  which  his  conduct  has 
wounded  are  bad. 

Hence  we  see  that  in  hourly-occurring  cases  like  these, 
to  limit  the  exercise  of  faculties  by  the  necessity  of  not  7 
giving  pain  to  others,  would  be  to  stop  the  proper  exer 
cise  of  faculties  in  some  persons,  for  the  purpose  of  allow 
ing  the  improper  exercise  of  faculties  in  the  rest/    More- 


96  DERIVATION   OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

over,  the  observance  of  such  a  rule  does  not,  as  at  first 
sight  appears,  prevent  pain.  For  though  he  who  is  re 
-strained  by  it  avoids  inflicting  suffering  on  his  fellows,  he 
does  so  at  the  expense  of  suffering  to  himself.  The  evil 
must  be  borne  by  some  one,  and  the  question  is  by  whom. 
Shall  the  Protestant,  by  showing  reverence  for  what  he 
does  not  revere,  tell  a  virtual  lie,  and  thus  do  violence  to 
his  conscientious  feeling  that  he  may  avoid  vexing  the  in 
tolerant  spirit  of  his  Catholic  neighbours  ?  or  shall  he  give 
the  rein  to  his  own  healthy  sincerity  and  independence, 
and  offend  their  unhealthy  bigotry  ?  Shall  the  honest 
man  repress  those  sentiments  that  make 'him  honest,  lest 
the  exhibition  of  them  should  give  pain  to  a  rogue  ?  or 
shall  he  respect  his  own  nobler  feelings,  and  hurt  the 
other's  baser  ones?  Between  these  alternatives  no  one 
can  well  pause.  And  here  indeed  we  get  down  to  the 
root  -of  the  matter.  For  be  it  remembered  the  universal 
law  of  life  is,  that  the  exercise  or  gratification  of  faculties 
strengthens  them ;  whilst,  on  the  contrary,  the  curbing 
or  inflicting  pain  upon  them,  entails  a  diminution  of  their 
power.  And  hence  it  follows  that  when  the  action  of  a 
normal  faculty  is  checked,  to  prevent  pain  being  given  to 
the  abnormal  faculties  of  others,  those  abnormal  faculties 
remain  as  active  as  they  were,  and  the  normal  one  becomes 
weaker  or  abnormal.  Whereas  under  converse  circum 
stances  the  normal  one  remains  strong,  and-4;he  abnormal 
ones  are  weakened,  or  made  more  normal.  J  In  the  one 
case  the  pain  is  detrimental,  because  it  retards  the  approxi 
mation  to  that  form  of  human  nature  under  which  the 
faculties  of  each  may  be  fully  exercised  without  displeas 
ure  to  the  like  faculties  of  all.  In  the  other  case  the  pain 
is  beneficial,  because  it  aids  the  approximation  to  that 
form.  Thus,  that  first  expression  of  the  law  which  arises 
immediately  from  the  conditions  of  social  existence,  turns 
out  to  be  the  true  one :  any  such  modification  of  it  as  the 


LIMIT    OF   ITS    APPLICATION.  97 

above,  necessitating  conduct  that  is  in  many  cases  abso 
lutely  mischievous. 

And  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  when  we  seek  to  express 
the  law  by  saying  that  every  man  has  full  liberty  to  exer 
cise  his  faculties,  provided  always  he  does  not  trench  upon 
the  similar  liberty  of  any  other,  we  commit  ourselves  to 
an  imperfection  of  an  opposite  character;  and  we  find  that 
there  are  many  cases  in  which  the  above  modified  expres 
sion  answers  better.  Various  ways  exist  in  which  the 
faculties  may  be  exercised  to  the  aggrieving  of  other  per 
sons,  without  the  law  of  equal  freedom  being  overstepped. 
A  man  may  behave  unamiably,  may  use  harsh  language, 
or  annoy  by  disgusting  habits ;  and  whoso  thus  offends 
the  normal  feelings  of  his  fellows,  manifestly  diminishes 
happiness.  If  we  say  that  every  one  is  free  to  -exercise 
his  faculties  so  long  only  as  he  does  not  inflict  pain  upon 
any  one  else,  we  forbid  all  such  conduct.  Whereas  if  we 
simply  limit  the  liberty  of  each  by  the  like  liberty  of  all, 
we  do  not  forbid  it ;  seeing  that  he  who  exercises  his  fac 
ulties  in  this  way,  does  not  hinder  others  from  exercising 
theirs  in  the  same  way,  and  to  the  same  extent.  How, 
then,  are  we  to  escape  from  this  difficulty?  Neither 
statement  of  the  law  quite  fulfils  our  requirement,  and 
yet  we  must  choose  one  of  them.  Which  must  it  be, 
and  why  ? 

It  ^.inust  be  the  original  one,  and  for  a  very  good  rea- 
son.>iLimiting  the  liberty  of  each  by  the  like  liberty  of 
all^excludes  a  wide  range  of  improper  actions,  but  does 
not  exclude  certain  other  improper  onds.  'Limiting  the 
liberty  of  each  by  the  necessity -of  not  giving  pain  to  the 
rest^xcludes  the  whole  of  these  improper  actions,  but 
^/excludes  along  with  them  many  others  that  are  proper.!// 

The  one  does  not  cut  off"  enough ;  the  other  cuts  off"  too 
~  much.   '  The  one  is  negatively  erroneous ;    the  other  is 
positively  so!"'*  Evidently,  then,  we  must  adopt  the  nega- 
5 


98  DERIVATION   OF   A   FIRST   PRINCIPLE. 

tivcly  erroneous  one,  seeing  that  its  shortcomings  may  be 
made  good  by  a  supplementary  law.7  And  here  we  find 
the  need  for  that  distinction  lately  drawn  between  justice 
and  negative  beneficence — a  distinction  which  we  habitu 
ally  make  in  the  affairs  of  life.  Justice  imposes  upon  the 
exercise  of  faculties  a  primary  series  of  limitations,  which 
is  strictly  true  as  far  as  it  goes.  Negative  beneficence 
imposes  a  secondary  series.  It  is  no  defect  in  the  first 
of  these  that  it  does  not  include  the  last.  The  two  are, 
in  the  main,  distinct;  and,  as  we  have  just  seen,  the 
attempt  to  unite  them  under  one  expression  leads  us  into 
fatal  errors. 

§  5.  \Yet  another  objection  will  probably  be  started. 
By  full- liberty  to  exercise  the  faculties,  is  meant  full 
liberty  to  do  all  that  the  faculties  prompt,  or,  in  other 
words,  to  do  all  that  the  individual  wills ;  and  it  may  be 
said,  that  if  the  individual  is  free  to  do  all  that  he  wills, 
provided  he  does  not  trespass  upon  certain  specified  claims 
of  others,  then  he  is  free  to  do  things  that  are  injurious  to 
himself-4-is  free  to  get  drunk,  or  to  commit  suicide.  To 
this  it  "must  be  in  the  first  place  replied,  as  above, -that 
whilst  the  law  now  laid  down  forbids  a  certain  class  of 
actions  as  immoral,  it  does  not  recognize  all  kinds  of 
immorality — that  the  restriction  it  puts  on  the  free  exer 
cise  of  faculties,  though  the  chief,  is  not  the  sole  restric 
tion,  and  must  be  received  without  prejudice  to  further 
ones.  Of  the  need  for  such  further  ones,  the  difficulty 
here  raised  furnishes  a  second  instance. 

Mark  now,  hoAvever,  that  these  supplementary  restric 
tions  are  of  quite  inferior  authority  to  the  original  law. 
Instead  of  being,  like  it,  capable  of  strictly  scientific 
development,  they  (under  existing  circumstances)  can  be 
unfolded  only  into  superior  forms  of  expediency.  The 
limit  put  to. each  man's  freedom,  by  the  like  freedom  of 


DIFFICULTY    OF   JUDGMENT.  99 

every  other  mantis  ar  limit  almost  always  possible  of  exact 
ascertainment ;  for  let  the  condition  of  things  be  what  it 
may,  the  respective  amounts  of  freedom  men  assume  can 
be  compared,  and  the^  equality  or  inequality  of  those 
amounts  recognizecf^f  But  when  we  set  about  drawing  A 
practical  deductions  from  the  propositions  that  a  man  is  \ 
not  at  liberty  fo  do  things  injurious  to  himself,  and  that 
he  is  not  at  liberty  (except  in  cases  like  those  lately  cited) 
to  do  what  may  give  unhappiness  to  his  neighbours,  we 
find  ourselves  involved  in  complicated  estimates  of  pleas-  / 
ures  and  pains,  to  the  obvious  peril  of  our  conclusions^' 
It  is  very  true,  that  to  trace  out  the  consequences  a  given 
act  will  entail  upon  oneself  or  another,  is  incomparably 
less  difficult  than  to  determine  the  ultimate  effects  of  some 
public  measure  upon  a  whole  nation ;  and  hence  the  being 
guided  by  expediency  in  private  life  is  proportionably 
less  dangerous.  Yet  it  is  also  true,  that  even  here,  trust- 
worth  inferences  are  attainable  in  but  a  minority  of  cases. 
In  the  first  place  we  frequently  cannot  say  whether  the 
bad  results  will  exceed  the  good  ones ;  and  in  the  second 
place  we  frequently  cannot  say  whether  the  faculties  on 
which  suffering  will  be  inflicted,  are  in  normal  or  abnor 
mal  states.  For  example,  though  it  is  very  manifest  that 
drunkenness  is  an  injurious  exercise  of  faculties,  as  being 
clearly  productive  of  more  pain  than  pleasure,  it  is  by  no 
means  manifest  how  much  work  is  proper  for  us,  and 
when  work  becomes  detrimental ;  it  is  by  no  means  mani 
fest  where  lies  the  line  between  due  and  undue  intellec 
tual  activity ;  it  is  by  no  means  manifest  what  amount  of 
advantage  will  justify  a  man  in  submitting  to  unsuitable 
climate  and  mode  of  life ;  and  yet  in  each  of  these  cases 
happiness  is  at  stake,  and  the  wrong  course  is  wrong  for 
the  same  reason  that  drunkenness  is  so.  Even  were  it 
possible  to  say  of  each  private  action  whether  the  result 
ing  gratification  did  or  did  not  preponderate  over  the 


100  DERIVATION   OF   A  FIRST   PRINCIPLE. 

resulting  suffering,  there  would  still  present  itself  this 
second  difficulty,  that  we  cannot  with  certainty  distin 
guish  suffering  that  is  detrimental,  from  suffering  that  is 
beneficial.  Whilst  we  are  as  yet  imperfectly  adapted  to 
our  conditions,  pain  must  inevitably  arise  from  the  re 
pression  of  faculties  that  are  too  active,  and  from  the  over 
tasking  of  those  that  are  not  equal  to  their  duties ;  and, 
as  "being  needful  to  the  development  of  the  ultimate  man, 
such  pain  cannot  be  held  damnatory  of  the  actions  causing 
it.  Thus,  referring  again  to  the  instances  just  cited,  it  is 
self-evident  that  the  ability  to  work  is  needful  for  the 
production  of  the  greatest  happiness ;  yet  is  the  acquire 
ment  of  this  ability  by  the  uncivilized  man  so  distress 
ing,  that  only  the  severest  discipline  will  force  him  to 
it.  That  degree  of  intelligence  which  our  existing  mode 
of  life  necessitates,  cannot  be  arrived  at  without  ages  of 
wearisome  application;  and  perhaps  cannot  get  organ 
ized  in  the  race  without  a  partial  and  temporary  sacrifice 
of  bodily  health.  The  realization  of  the  Divine  Idea  im 
plies  the  peopling  of  every  habitable  region  ;  and  this  im 
plies  the  adaptation  of  mankind  to  a  variety  of  climates — 
an  adaptation  which  cannot  be  undergone  without  great 
suffering.  :  Here,  then,  are  cases  in  which  men's  liberty 
must  not  be  limited  by  the  necessity  of  not  injuring  them 
selves  ;  seeing  that  it  cannot  be  so  limited  without  a  sus 
pension  of  our  approach  to  greatest  happiness.  Similarly 
we  saw  awhile  since  (p.  95),  that  there  are  cases  in  which 
for  the  same  reason  men's  liberty  must  not  be  limited  by 
the  necessity  of  not  inflicting  pain  upon  others.  And  the 
fact  now  to  be  noticed  is,  that  we  possess  no  certain  way 
of  distinguishing  the  two  groups  of  cases  thus  exemplified 
from  those  cases  in  which  the  doing  what  diminishes  hap 
piness,  either  in  ourselves  or  others,  is  both  immediately 
and  ultimately  detrimental,  and  therefore  wrong.  ISTot 
being  able  to  define  specifically  the  constitution  of  the 


PAIN   MAY   BE   NECESSARY   TO   HAPPINESS.  101 

ideal  man,  but  being  able  to  define  it  generically  only — • 
not  being  able  to  determine  the  ratios  of  the  several  fac 
ulties  composing  that  constitution,  but  being  able  simply 
to  lay  down  certain  laws  which  their  action  must  conform 
to — we  are  quite  incompetent  so  say  of  every  particular 
deed  whether  it .  is  or  is  not  accordant  with  that  constitu 
tion.  Or,  putting  the  difficulty  in  its  simplest  form,  we 
may  say,  that  as  both  of  these  supplementary  limitations 
involve  the  term  happiness,  and  as  happiness  is  for  the 
.  present  capable  only  of  a  generic  and  not  of  a  specific 
definition  (p.  15),  they  do  not  admit  of  scientific  develop 
ment.  Though  abstractedly  correct  limitations,  and  limi 
tations  which  the  ideal  man  will  strictly  observe,  they  can 
not  Ije  reduced  to  concrete  forms  until  the  ideal  man 
exists.) 


i 


s\ 

§  6.  \  And  now  we  have  arrived  at  the  threshold  of' 
an  important  truth  touching  this  matter ;  the^  truth 
namely,  that  only  by  a  universal  exercise  of  this  alleged 
liberty  of  each,  limited  alone  by  the  like  liberty  of  all, 
can  there  ever  arise  a  separation  of  those  acts  which, 
though  incidentally  and  temporarily  injurious  to  ourselves 
or  others,  are  indirectly  beneficial,  from^  those  acts  which 
are  necessarily  and  eternally  injurious.  *  For  manifestly, 
that  ~  non-adaptation  of  faculties  to  their  functions,  from 
which  springs  every  species  of  evil,  must  consist  either  in 
excess  or  defect.  And  manifestly,  in  the  wide  range  of 
cases  we  are  now  treating  of,  there  exists  no  mode  but 
tentative  one  of  distinguishing  that  exercise  of  faculties 
which  produces  suffering  because  it  oversteps  the  condi 
tions  of  normal  existence,  from  that  other  exercise  of  facul 
ties  which  produces  suffering  because  it  falls  short  of  those 
conditions.  And  manifestly,  the  due  employment  of  this 
tentative  mode  requires  that  each  man  shall  have  the 
greatest  freedom  compatible  with  the  like  freedom  of  all 


102  DERIVATION   OF   A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

others.  Or,  turning  the  proposition  the  other  side  up,  we 
may  say,  that  whilst  these  secondary  conditions  of  great 
est  happiness  are  really  fixed,  yet  the  practical  interpreta 
tion  of  them  requiring  a  detailed  knowledge  of  the  ulti 
mate  human  constitution,  bodily  and  mental,  and  such 
detailed  knowledge  being  unattainable,  our  course  is  to 
regard  the  law  of  equal  freedom  as  setting  up  the  only 
recognizable  limit  to  the  exercise  of  faculties,  knowing 
that  the  other  limits  will  inevitably  make  themselves  felt, 
and  that  in  virtue  of  the  law  of  adaptation,  there  must 
eventually  arise  a  complete  conformity  to  them. 
1 —  That,  on  this  course  being  pursued,  there  will  happen 
a  gradual  cessation  of  the  detrimentally  painful  actions, 
whilst  the  beneficially  painful  ones  will  be  continued  until 
they  have  ceased  to  be  painful,  may  be  made  clear  by  a  few 
illustrations.  Thus,  the  change  from  the  impulsive  nature 
of  the  savage  to  that  nature  which  enables  the  civilized  man 
to  sacrifice  a  present  gratification  for  a  future  greater  one, 
involves  much  suffering ;  but  the  necessities  of  social  life 
demanding  such  a  change,  and  continually  visiting  the 
lack  of  a  self-restraining  power  with  severe  punishment, 
ensure  a  constant  though  irksome  endeavour  on  the  part 
of  all  to  acquire  this  power — an  endeavour  that  must 
surely  though  slowly  succeed.  Conversely,  the  prevalence 
amongst  men  of  a  somewhat  undue  desire  for  food,  entail 
ing  as  it  perpetually  does  much  bodily,  and  some  mental, 
affliction,  is  sure  to  be  therefore  accompanied  by  such  at 
tempts  at  abstemiousness,  as  must,  by  constantly  curbing 
it,  finally  reduce  this  desire  to  a  normal  intensity.*  And 

*  Why  the  appetite  for  food  should  now  be  greater  than  is  proper, 
seems  at  first  difficult  to  understand.  On  calling  to  mind,  however,  the 
conditions  of  the  aboriginal  man,  we  shall  find  an  explanation  of  this 
apparent  anomaly  in  the  fact,  that  the  irregularity  in  his  supplies  of  food 
necessitated  an  ability  to  eat  largely  when  food  was  attainable,  and 
necessitated,  therefore)  a;  corresponding  desire.  Now  that  the  supplies 


NECESSAKY  AND   INCIDENTAL   FEELINGS.  103 

what  so  manifestily  happens  in  these  simple,  cases,  with 
equal  certainty  happen  in  those  complex  ones  above 
exemplified,  where  the  good  and  bad  results  are  more 
nearly  balanced :  for  although  it  may  be  impossible  in 
such  cases  for  the  intellect  to  estimate  the  respective 
amounts  of  pleasure  and  pain  consequent  upon  each  alter 
native,  yet  will  experience  enable  the  constitution  itself  to 
do  this ;  and  will  further  cause  it  instinctively  to  shun 
that  course  which  produces  on  the  whole  most  suffering, 
or,  in  other  words,  most  sins  against  the  necessities  of 
existence,  knd  to  choose  that  which  least,  sins  against 
them.  Turning  to  those  actions  which  put  us  in  direct 
relationship  to  other  men,  it  must  in  the  same  manner 
happen  that  such  of  them  as  give  no  necessary  displeasure 
to  any  one,  will  be  persevered  in,  and  the  faculties  answer 
ing  to  them  developed ;  whilst,  on  the  contrary,  actions 
necessarily  displeasing  to  our  neighbours,  must,  by  virtue 
of  the  disagreeable  reaction  which  they  commonly  entail 
upon  ourselves,  be,  in  the  average  of  cases,  subject  to  a  cer 
tain  degree  of  repression — a  repression  that  must  ultimately 
tell  upon  the  desires  they  spring  from.'  And  now  observe 
what  it  is  the  special  -purpose  of  the  present  argument 
to  show,  namely,  thatin  the  course  of  this  process  there 
must  be  continually  produced  a  different  effect  upon  con 
duct  which  is  necessarily  painful  to  others,  from  that  pro 
duced  upon  conduct  that  is  incidentally  painful  only. 
Conduct  which  hurts  necessary  feelings  in  others,  will,  as 
just  explained,  inevitably  undergo  restraint  and  conse 
quent  diminution :  conduct  which  hurts  only  their  inci 
dental  feelings,  as  those  of  caste,  or  prejudice,  will  not 
inevitably  do  so  ;  but,  if  it  springs  from  necessary  feelings, 
will,  on  the  contrary,  be  continued  at  the  expense  of  these 

of  food  have  become  regular,  and  no  contingent  periods  of  long  fast 
ing  have  to  be  provided  against,  the  desire  is  in  excess  and  has  to  be 
abated. 


104  DERIVATION    OF    A   FIEST   PRINCIPLE. 

incidental  feelings^  and  to  the  final  suppression  of  them. 
When  men  mutually  behave  in  a  way  that  offends  some 
essential  element  in  the  nature  of  each,  and  all  in  turn 
have  to  bear  the  consequent  suffering,  there  will  arise  a 
tendency  to  curb  the  desire  that  makes  them  so  behave. 
When,  instead  of  this,  they  keep  hurting  in  each  other 
those  non-essential  elements  of  character  peculiar  to  a 
passing  phase  of  things,  and  are  impelled  to  do  this  by 
impulses  that  are  permanently  requisite,  then  will  these 
non-essential  elements  be  extirpated.  Thus,  the  existing 
confusion  of  necessary  and  conventional  feelings,  neces 
sary  and  conventional  circumstances,  and  feelings  and 
circumstances  that  are  partly  necessary  and  partly  conven 
tional,  will  eventually  work  itself  clear.  Conventional  feel 
ings  will  give  way  before  necessary  circumstances,  and 
conventional  circumstances  before  necessary  feelings.  And 
when,  as  a  result  of  this  process,(jeomplete  adaptatioji 
between  constitution  and  conditions  has  been  arrived) 
at,  a  complete  classification  of  actions  into  essentially 
injurious  and  essentially  beneficial,  will  have  been  arrived 
at  also. 

If,  then,  we  find  that  the  one  thing  needful  to  produce 
ultimate  subordination  to  these  secondary  limits  of  right 
conduct  is,  that  we  should  have  the  opportunity  of  freely 
coming  in  contact  with  them — should  be  allowed  freely  to 
expand  our  natures  in  all  directions  until  the  available 
space  has  been  filled,  and  the  true  bounds  have  made 
themselves  felt — if  a  development  of  these  secondary  lim 
its  into  practical  codes  of  duty  can  only  thus  be  accom 
plished,  then  does  the  supreme  authority  of  our  first  law — 
the  liberty  of  each  limited  alone  by  the  like  liberty  of  all 
— become  still  more  manifest,  seeing  that  that  right  to 
exercise  the  faculties  which  it  asserts,  must  precede  the 
unfolding  of  this  supplementary  morality.  Indeed,  re 
garding  it  from  this  point  of  view,  we  may  almost  say 


A   DILEMMA.  105 

thatjhe  first  law  is  the  sole  law ;  for  we  find  that  of  the 
several  conditions  to  greatest  happiness  it  is  the  only  one 
at  present  capable  of  a  systematic  development ;  and  we 
further  find  that  conformity  to  it,  ensures  ultimate  con 
formity  to  the  others.) 

§  7.  Nevertheless,  it  must  still  be  admitted,  that  in 
cases  where  these  secondary  limitations  to  the  exercise  of 
faculties  are  undoubtedly  transgressed,  the  full  assertion 
of  this  law  of  equal  freedom  betrays  us  into  an  apparent 
dilemma.  By  drunkenness,  or  by  brutality  of  manner, 
our  own  happiness,  or  the  happiness  of  others,  is  dimin 
ished  ;  and  that  not  in  an  incidental  but  in  a  necessary 
way.  And  if  by  affirming  a  man's  liberty  to  do  all  that 
he  wills  so  long  as  he  respects  the  like  liberty  of  every 
other,  we  imply  that  he  is  at  liberty  to  get  drunk  or  to 
behave  brutally,  then  we  fall  into  the  inconsistency  of  af 
firming  that  he  is  at  liberty  to  do  something  essentially 
destructive  of  happiness. 

Of  this  difficulty  nothing  can  be  said,  save  that  it 
seems  in  part  due  to  the  impossibility  of  making  the  per 
fect  law  recognize  an  imperfect  state,  and  in  part  to  that 
defect  in  our  powers  of  expression  elsewhere  exemplified 
(p.  52).  As  matters  stand,  however,  we  must  deal  Avith 
it  as  best  we  may.  There  is  clearly  no  alternative  but  to 
declare  man's  freedom  to  exercise  his  faculties;  for  witli- 
out  this  freedom  fulfilment  of  the  Divine  will  is  impossi 
ble^  There  is  clearly  no  alternative  but  to  declare  the 
several  limitations  of  that  freedom  needful  for  the  achieve 
ment  of  greatest  happiness.  And  there  is  clearly  no  al 
ternative  but  to  develop  the  first  and  chief  of  these  limit 
ations  separately ;  seeing  as  we  have  done  that  a  devel 
opment  of  the  others  is  at  present  impossible.  Against 
the  consequence  of  neglecting  these  secondary  limitations, 
we  must  therefore  guard  ourselves  as  well  as  we  can ;  sup- 
5* 


106  DERIVATION    OF   A   FIRST   PRINCIPLE. 

plying  the  place  of  scientific  deductions  from  them,  by 
such  inferences  as  observation  and  experience  enable  us  to 
make. 

§  8.  Finally,  however,  there  is  satisfaction  in  the 
thought,  that  no  such  imperfection  as  this,  can  in  the  least 
vitiate  any  of  the  conclusions  we  are  now  about  to  draw. 
\Liberty  of  action  being  the  first  essential  to  exercise  of 
faculties,  and  therefore  the  first  essential  to  happiness ;  and 
the  liberty  of  each  limited  by  the  like  liberty  of  all,  being 
the  form  which  this  first  essential  assumes  when  applied 
to  many  instead  of  one  (§  3),  it  follows  that  this  liberty 
of  each,  limited  by  the  like  liberty  of  all,  is  the  rule  in 
conformity  with  which  society  must  be  organized._y  Free 
dom  being  the  prerequisite  to  normal  life  in  the  individ 
ual,  equal  freedom  becomes  the  prerequisite  to  normal  life 
in  society.  And  if  this  law  of  equal  freedom  is  the  pri 
mary  law  of  right  relationship  between  man  and  man, 
then  no  desire  to  get  fulfilled  a  secondary  law  can  warrant 
us^in  breaking  it. 

(  Now  we  shall  find  that  in  the  unfolding  of  this  primary 
limitation  to  the  exercise  of  faculties  into  a  series  of  prac 
tical  regulations,  it  is  impossible  to  recognize  any  second 
ary  limitations  without  committing  a  breach  of  the  pri 
mary  one.  ^jyor,  in  what  must  recognition  of  any  second 
ary  limitations  consist  ?  It  must  consist  in  the  establish 
ment  in  our  social  organization  of  certain  further  restric 
tions  on  the  exercise  of  faculties  besides  those  imposed  by 
the  law  of  equal  freedom.  And  how  are  these  further 
restrictions  to  be  enforced  ?  Manifestly,  by  men.  Now 
the  men  who  enforce  them  must  necessarily  assume  in  so 
doing  a  greater  amount  of  freedom  than  those  on  whom 
they  are  enforced ;— vthat  is  to  say,  they  must  transgress 
the  primary  law  to  prevent  others  transgressing  secondary 
ones. 


LIMITATION  TO  THE  EXERCISE  OF  THE  FACULTIES.       10? 

/"  \ 

Hence,  in  drawing  from  it  deductions  respecting  the 
equitable  constitution  of  society!  we  may  safely  assert  in 
full  this  liberty  of  each  limited  alone  by  the  like  liberty 
of  all — must  so  assert  it.  The  neglect  of  other  limitations 
will  in  no  way  affect  the  accuracy  of  our  conclusions,  so 
long  as  we  confine  ourselves  to  deducing  from  this  funda 
mental  law  the  just  relationships  of  men  to  each  other ; 
whereas  we  cannot  include  these  other  limitations  in  our 
premises  without  vitiating  those  conclusions.  We  have 
no  alternative  therefore  but,  for  the  time  being,  to  ignore 
such  other  limitations ;  leaving  that  partial  interpretation 
of  them  which  is  at  present  possible  to  us,  for  subsequent 
statement. 


CIIAPTEE    Y. 

SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

§  1.  Having  inquired  how  the  Divine  Idea,  greatest 
happiness,  is  to  be  realized — having  found  that  it  is  to  be 
realized  through  the  exercise  of  faculties — and  having 
found  that,  to  fulfil  its  end,  such  exercise  of  faculties  must 
be  confined  within  certain  limits ;  let  us  now  pursue  the 
investigation  a  step  further,  and  see  whether  there  does 
not  exist  in  man  himself  an  impulse  to  claim  that  exercise, 
and  an  impulse  to  respect  those  limits.  Some  such  pro 
visions  are  clearly  needful  for  the  completion  of  the  crea 
tive  scheme.  It  would  be  quite  at  variance  with  the  gen 
eral  law  of  our  structure,  that  there  should  be  nothing  to 
restrain  us  from  the  undue  exercise  of  faculties,  but  ab 
stract  considerations  like  those  set  forth  in  the  last  chap 
ter.  As  elsewhere  pointed  out  (p.  30),  man  is  ruled  by 
quite  other  instrumentalities  than  intellectual  ones.  The 
regulation  of  his  conduct  is  not  left  to  the  accident  of  a 


108       SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

philosophical  inquiry.  We  may,  therefore,  expect  to  find 
some  special  agent  by  which  the  distinction  between  right 
and  wrong  exercise  of  faculties  is  recognized  and  respond 
ed  to. 

§  2.  From  what  he  has  already  gathered,  the  reader 
will  of  course  infer  that  this  agent  is  that  Moral  Sense,  in 
Avhose  existence  we  elsewhere  saw  good  reason  to  believe. 
And  possibly  he  will  anticipate  the  further  inference,  that 
this  first  and  all-essential  law,  declaratory  of  the  liberty 
of  each  limited  only  by  the  like  liberty  of  all,  is  that  fun 
damental  truth  of  which  the  moral  sense  is  to  give  an  in 
tuition,  and  which  the  intellect  is  to  develop  into  a  scien 
tific  morality. 

Of  the  correctness  of  this  inference  there  are  various 
proofs,  upon  an  examination  of  which  we  must  now  enter. 
And  first  on  the  list  stands  the  fact,  that,  out  of  some 
source  or  other  in  men's  minds,  there  keep  continually 
coming  utterances  more  or  less  completely  expressive  of 
this  truth.  Quite  independently  of  any  such  analytical 
examinations  as  that  just  concluded,  men  perpetually  ex 
hibit  a  tendency  to  assert  the  equality  of  human  rights. 
In  all  ages,  but  more  especially  in  later  ones,  has  this  ten 
dency  been  visible.  In  our  own  history  we  may  detect 
signs  of  its  presence  as  early  as  the  time  of  Edward  I.,  in 
whose  writs  of  summons  it  was  said  to  be  "  a  most  equitable 
rule,  that  what  concerns  all  should  be  approved  of  by  all." 
How  x)ur  institutions  have  been  influenced  by  it  may  be 
seen  in  the  judicial  principle  that  "  all  men  are  equal  be 
fore  the  law."  The  doctrine  that  "  all  men  are  naturally 
equal "  (of  course  only  in  so  far  as  their  claims  are  con 
cerned),  has  not  only  been  asserted  by  philanthropists  like 
Granville  Sharpe,  but  as  Sir  Robert  Filmer,  a  once  re 
nowned  champion  of  absolute  monarchy,  tells  us,  "  Hey- 
ward,  Blackwood,  Barclay,  and  others  that  have  bravely 


FAITH    IK   THE    EQUALITY   OF   EIGHTS.  109 

vindicated  the  rights  of  kings,  *  *  *  with  one  consent 
admitted  the  natural  liberty  and  equality  of  mankind." 
Again,  we  find  the  declaration  of  American  Independence 
affirming  that  "  all  men  have  equal  rights  to  life,  liberty, 
and  the  pursuit  of  happiness ; "  and  the  similar  assertion 
that  "  every  man  has  an  equal  right  with  every  other  man 
to  a  voice  in  the  making  of  the  laws  which  all  are  required 
to  obey,"  was  the  maxim  of  the  Complete  Suffrage  move 
ment.  In  his  essay  on  Civil  Government,  Locke,  too,  ex 
presses  the  opinion  that  there  is  "  nothing  more  evident 
than  that  creatures  of  the  same  species  and  rank,  promis- 
ciiously  born  to  the  same  advantages  of  nature,  and  the 
use  of  the  same  faculties,  should  also  be  equal  one  amongst 
another  without  subordination  or  subjection."  And  those 
who  wish  for  more  authorities  who  have  expressed  the 
same  conviction,  may  add  the  names  of  Judge  Blackstone 
and  "  the  judicious  Hooker." 

The  sayings  and  doings  of  daily  life  continually  imply 
some  intuitive  belief  of  this  kind.  We  take  for  granted 
its  universality,  when  we  appeal  to  men's  sense  of  justice. 
In  moments  of  irritation  it  shows  itself  in  such  expressions 
as — «  How  would  you  like  it  ?  "  "What  is  that  to  you ?" 
"  I've  as  good  a  right  as  you,"  &c.  Our  praises  of  liberty 
are  pervaded  by  it ;  and  it  gives  bitterness  to  the  invec 
tives  with  which  we  assail  the  oppressors  of  mankind. 
Nay,  indeed,  so  spontaneous  is  this  faith  in  the  equality 
of  human  rights,  that  our  very  language  embodies  it. 
Equity  and  equal  are  from  the  same  root ;  and  equity  lit 
erally  means  equalness. 

It  is  manifest,  moreover,  that  some  such  faith  is  contin 
ually  increasing  in  strength.  Rightly  understood,  the  ad 
vance  from  a  savage  to  a  .cultivated  state  is  the  advance 
of  its  dominion.  It  is  by  their  greater  harmony  with  it 
that  the  laws,  opinions,  and  usages  of  a  civilized  society 
are  chiefly  distinguished  from  those  of  a  barbarous  one. 


110        SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIEST  PRINCIPLE. 

How  instrumental  it  has  been  in  modifying  the  events  of 
the  past  was  elsewhere  hinted  (p.  35).  If  we  call  to  mind 
the  political  agitations  that  have  run  a  successful  course 
within  these  few  years,  and  consider  likewise  those  that 
are  going  on  around  us,  we  shall  find  them  nearly  all 
strongly  tinctured  by  it.  Nor  can  we  contemplate  the 
late  European  revolutions,  and  read  the  preambles  to  the 
new  constitutions  that  have  sprung  out  of  them,  without 
perceiving  that  a  conviction  of  the  equality  of  human 
rights  is  now  stronger  and  more  general  than  ever. 

Not  without  meaning  is  the  continued  life  and  growth 
of  this  conviction.  He  must  indeed '  have  a  strange  way 
of  interpreting  social  phenomena,  who  can  believe  that 
the  reappearance  of  it,  with  ever-increasing  frequency,  in 
laws,  books,  agitations,  revolutions,  means  nothing.  If 
we  analyze  them,  we  shall  find  all  beliefs  to  be  in  some 
way  dependent  upon  mental  conformation — temporary 
ones  upon  temporary  characteristics  of  our  nature — per 
manent  ones  upon  its  permanent,  characteristics.  And 
when  we  find  that  a  belief  like  this  in  the  equal  freedom 
of  all  men,  is  not  only  permanent,  but  daily  gaming 
ground,  we  have  good  reason  to  conclude  that  it  corre 
sponds  to  some  essential  element  of  our  moral  constitution : 
more  especially  since  we  find  that  its  existence  is  in  har 
mony  with  that  chief  prerequisite  to  greatest  happiness 
lately  dwelt  upon ;  and  that  its  growth  is  in  harmony  with 
that  law  of  adaptation  by  which  this  greatest  happiness 
is  being  wrought  out. 

Such,  at  least,  is  the  hypothesis  here  adopted.  From 
the  above  accumulation  of  evidence  it  is  inferred  that 
there  exists  in  man  what  may  be  termed/an  instinct  of 
personal  rights — a  feeling  that  leads  him  to  claim  as  great 
a  share  of  natural  privilege  as  is  claimed  by  others — a 
feeling  that  leads  him  to  repel  any  thing  like  an  encroach 
ment  upon  what  he  thinks  his  sphere  of  original  freedom. 


THE   DISCIPLES   OF   BENTHAM.  Ill 

By  virtue  of  this  impulse,  individuals,  as  units  of  the  so 
cial  mass,  tend  to  assume  like  relationships  with  the  atoms 
of  matter,  surrounded  as  these  are  by  their  respective  at 
mospheres  of  repulsion  as  well  as  of  attraction.  And  per 
haps  social  stability  may  ultimately  be  seen  to  depend 
upon  the  due  balance  of  these  forces. 

§  3.  There  exists,  however,  a  dominant  sect  of  so- 
called  philosophical  politicians  who  treat  with  contempt 
this  belief  that  men  have  any  claims  antecedent  to  those 
endorsed  by  governments.  As  disciples  of  Bentham,  con 
sistency  requires  them  to  do  this.  Accordingly,  although 
it  does  violence  to  their  secret  perceptions,  they  boldly 
deny  the  existence  of  "  rights  "  entirely.  They  neverthe 
less  perpetually  betray  a  belief  in  the  doctrines  which 
they  professedly  reject.  They  inadvertently  talk  about 
justice,  especially  when  it  concerns  themselves,  in  much 
the  same  style  as  their  opponents.  They  draw  the  same 
distinction  between  layo  and  equity  that  other  people  do. 
They  applaud  fairness,  and  honour,  quite  as  if  they 
thought  them  something  more  than  mere  words.  And 
when  robbed,  or  assaulted,  or  wrongly  imprisoned,  they 
exhibit  the  same  indignation,  the  same  determination  to 
oppose  the  aggressor,  utter  the  same  denunciations  of 
tyranny,  and  the  same  loud  demands  for  redress,  as  the 
sternest  assertors  of  the  rights  of  man.  By  way  of  ex 
plaining  such  inconsistencies,  it  is  indeed  alleged,  that  the 
feeling  thus  manifested  is  nothing  but  the  result  of  a  grad 
ually-acquired  conviction  that  benefits  flow  from  some 
kinds  of  action,  and  evils  from  other  kinds ;  and  it  is  said 
that  the  sympathies  and  antipathies  respectively  con 
tracted  toward  these,  exhibit  themselves,  as  a  love  of 
justice,  and  a  hatred  of  injustice.  To  which  supposition 
it  was  by  implication  elsewhere  replied,  that  it  would  be 
equally  wise  to  conclude  that  hunger  springs  from  a  con- 


112       SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

viction  of  the  benefit  of  eating ;  or  that  love  of  offspring 
is  the  result  of  a  wish  to  maintain  the  species ! 

But  it  is  amusing  when,  after  all,  it  turns  out  that  the 
ground  on  which  these  philosophers  have  taken  their 
stand,  and  from  which  with  such  self-complacency  they 
shower  their  sarcasms,  is  nothing  but  an  adversary's  mine, 
destined  to  blow  the  vast  fabric  of  conclusions  they  have 
based  on  it  into  nonentity.  This  so  solid-looking  princi 
ple  of  "  the  greatest  happiness  to  the  greatest  number," 
needs  but  to  have  a  light  brought  near  it,  and  lo !  it  ex 
plodes  into  the  astounding  assertion,  that  all  men  have 
equal  rights  to  happiness  (p.  34) — an  assertion  far  more 
sweeping  and  revolutionary  than  any  of  those  which  are 
assailed  with  so  much  scorn.* 

When  we  see,  then,  that  an  instinct  of  personal  rights 
manifests  itself  unceasingly  in  opinions  and  institutions ; 
when  further  we  find  that  the  attempt  to  trace  the  moni 
tions  of  this  instinct  to  experience,  betrays  us  into  an  ab 
surdity  ;  and  when,  lastly,  the  dogma  of  those  who  most 
sturdily  deny  that  there  is  such  an  instinct,  proves  to  be 
only  another  emanation  from  it — we  find  ourselves  in  pos 
session  of  the  strongest  possible  evidence  of  its  existence — 
the  testimony  of  all  parties.  We  are  therefore  justified 
in  considering  that  existence  as  sufficiently  proved. 

§  4.  But  why,  it  may  be  asked,  should  there  need  be 
any  sentiment  leading  men  to  claim  the  liberty  of  action 
requisite  for  the  due  exercise  of  faculties,  and  prompting 
them  to  resist  encroachments  upon  that  liberty?  Will 
not  the  several  faculties  themselves  do  this,  by  virtue  of 

*  "We  do  not  here  debate  the  claims  of  this  maxim.  It  is  sufficient  for 
present  purposes  to  remark,  that  were  it  true  it  would  be  utterly  useless  as 
a  first  principle ;  both  from  the  impossibility  of  determining  specifically 
what  happiness  is,  and  from  the  want  of  a  measure  by  which  equitably  to 
mete  it  out,  could  we  define  it. 


GRATIFICATION   OF   THE   FACULTIES.  113 

their  desires  for  activity,  which  cannot  otherwise  be  grati 
fied  ?  Surely  there  is  no  necessity  for  a  special  impulse  to 
make  a  man  do  that  which  all  his  impulses  conjointly 
tend  to  make  him  do. 

This  is  not  so  serious  an  objection  as  it  appears  to  be. 
For  although,  were  there  no  such  sentiment  as  this  sup 
posed  one,  each  faculty  in  turn  might  impel  its  possessor 
to  oppose  a  diminution  of  its  own  sphere  of  action,  yet, 
during  the  dormancy  of  that  faculty,  there  would  be  noth 
ing  to  prevent  the  freedom  requisite  for  its  future  exercise 
from  being  infringed  upon.  It  may,  perhaps,  be  rejoined, 
that  the  mere  consciousness  that  there  must  again  occur 
occasions  for  the  use  of  such  freedom  will  constitute  a 
sufficient  incentive  to  defend  it.  But  plausible  as  this 
supposition  looks,  it  does  not  tally  with  facts.  We  do  not 
find  on  inquiry,  that  each  faculty  has  a  special  foresight- 
takes  thought  for  its  gratifications  to  come :  we  find,  on 
the  contrary,  that  to  provide  for  the  future  gratification 
of  the  faculties  at  large,  is  the  office  of  faculties  appointed 
solely  for  that  purpose.  Thus,  referring  once  more  by 
way  of  illustration  to  the  acquisitive  instinct,  we  see,  that, 
when  this  is  wanting,  the  desires  for  food,  for  clothing, 
for  shelter,  together  with  those  many  other  desires  which 
property  ministers  to,  do  not  of  themselves  prompt  that 
accumulation  of  property  on  which  the  continuance  of 
their  satisfaction  depends.  Each  of  them,  when  active, 
impels  the  individual  to  take  means  for  its  present  fulfil 
ment  :  but  does  not  prompt  him  to  lay  by  the  means  for 
its  future  fulfilment.  To  so  prompt  him  there  needs  a  cer 
tain  amount  of  this  acquisitive  instinct,  which,  in  pursu 
ing  its  own  gratification,  incidentally  secures  to  other  in 
stincts  the  means  of  their  gratification.  Similarly,  then, 
with  liberty  of  action.  It  is  argued,  that  as  each  fac 
ulty  does  not  look  after  its  own  particular  fund  of  neces 
saries,  so  neither  does  it  look  after  its  own  particular 


SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

sphere  of  activity ;  and  that  as  there  is  a  special  faculty  to 
which  the  providing  of  a  general  fund  of  necessaries  is 
consigned,  so  likewise  is  there  a  special  faculty  to  which 
the  maintenance  of  a  general  sphere  of  activity  is  con 
signed.  Or  perhaps  we  may  most  clearly  express  the  re 
lationship  in  which  these  two  faculties  stand  to  the  rest, 
by  saying,  that  whilst  it  is  the  function  of  the  one  to 
accumulate  the  matter  on  which  the  faculties  at  large  are 
to  be  exercised,  it  is  the  function  of  the  other  to  preserve 
the  freedom  of  motion  by  which  that  matter  is  both  ob 
tained  and  made  use  of. 

§  5.  Seeing,  however,  that  this  instinct  of  personal 
rights  is  a  purely  selfish  instinct,  leading  each  man  to, 
assert  and  defend  his  own  liberty  of  action,  there  remains 
the  question,  Whence  comes  our  perception  of  the  rights 
of  others  ? 

The  way  to  a  solution  of  this  difficulty  has  been  opened 
*By  Adam  Smith  in  his  "  Theory  of  Moral  Sentiments." 
It  is  the  aim  of  that  work  to  show  that  the  proper  regula 
tion  of  our  conduct  to  one  another,  is  secured  by  means  of 
a  faculty  whose  function  it  is  to  excite  in  each  being  the 
emotions  displayed  by  surrounding  ones — a  faculty  which 
awakens  a  like  state  of  sentiment,  or,  as  he  terms  it,  "  a 
fellow  feeling  with  the  passions  of  others  " — the  faculty, 
in  short,  which  we  commonly  call  Sympathy.  As  illustra 
tions  of  the  mode  in  which  this  agent  acts,  he  quotes  cases 
like  these : 

"  Persons  of  delicate  fibres,  and  weak  constitution  of 
body,  complain  that  in  looking  on  the  sores  and  ulcers 
which  are  exposed  by  beggars  in  the  streets,  they  are  apt 
to  feel  an  itching  or  uneasy  sensation  in  the  corresponding 
part  of  their  own  bodies."  "  Men  of  most  robust  make 
observe,  that  in  looking  upon  sore  eyes  they  often  feel  a 
very  sensible  soreness  in  their  own."  "  Our  joy  for  the 


INFLUENCE   OF   SYMPATHY.  115 

deliverence  of  those  heroes  of  tragedy  or  romance  who 
interest  us,  is  as  sincere  as  our  grief  for  their  distress, 
and  our  fellow-feeling  for  their  misery,  is  not  more  real 
than  that  for  their  happiness."  "  We  blush  for  the  impu 
dence  and  rudeness  of  another,  though  he  himself  ap 
pears  to  have  no  sense  of  the  impropriety  of  his  be 
haviour." 

To  these  facts  cited  by  Adam  Smith,  may  be  added 
many  others  of  like  import ;  such  as  that  people — women 
especially — start  or  shriek  on  seeing  an  accident  occur  to 
others ;  that  unpractised  assistants  at  surgical  operations 
often  faint ;  that  out  of  the  soldiers  drawn  up  to  witness 
a  flogging,  usually  several  drop  down  in  the  ranks  ;  that 
a  boy  has  been  known  to  die  on  witnessing  an  execution. 
We  have  all  experienced  the  uncomfortable  feeling  of 
shame  produced  in  us  by  the  blunders  and  confusion  of  a 
nervous  speaker;  and  most  likely  every  one  has  some 
time  or  other  been  put  into  a  horrible  tremor  on  seeing 
another  at  the  edge  of  a  precipice.  The  converse  action 
of  the  faculty  is  equally  observable.  Thus,  we  find  our 
selves  unable  to  avoid  joining  in  the  merriment  of  our 
friends,  whilst  unaware  of  its  cause;  and  children,  much 
to  their  annoyance,  are  often  forced  to  laugh  in  the  midst 
of  their  tears,  by  witnessing  the  laughter  of  those  around 
them.  These  and  many  like  evidences  prove  that,  as 
Burke  says,  "  sympathy  must  be  considered  as  a  sort  of 
substitution  by  which  we  are  put  into  the  place  of 
another  man,  and  affected  in  many  respects  as  he  is 
affected." 

In  tracing  our  benevolent  actions  to  the  influence  of 
such  a  faculty — in  concluding  that  we  are  led  to  relieve 
the  miseries  of  others  from  a  desire  to  rid  ourselves  of  the 
pain  given  by  the  sight  of  misery,  and  to  make  others 
happy,  because  we  participate  in  their  happiness,  Adam 
Smith  puts  forth  what  seems  to  be  a  quite  satisfactory 


116        SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

theory.  But  lie  has  overlooked  one  of  its  most  important 
applications.  Not  recognizing  any  such  impulse  as  that 
which  urges  men  to  maintain  their  claims,  he  did  not  see 
that  their  respect  for  the  claims  of  others,  may  be  ex 
plained  in  the  same  way.  He  did  not  perceive  that  the 
sentiment  of  justice  is  nothing  but  a  sympathetic  aifection 
of  the  instinct  of  personal  rights — a  sort  of  reflex  function 
of  it.  Such,  however,  must  be  the  case,  if  that  instinct  ex 
ists,  and  if  this  hypothesis  of  Adam  Smith's  be  true. 
Here  lies  the  explanation  of  those  qualms  of  conscience,  as 
we  call  them,  felt  by  men  who  have  committed  dishonest 
actions.  It  is  through  this  instrumentality  that  we  receive 
satisfaction  on  paying  another  what  is  due  to  him.  And 
with  these  two  faculties  also,  originate  that  indignation 
which  narratives  of  political  oppression  excite  in  us,  and 
that  gnashing  of  the  teeth  with  which  we  read  of  the 
slave-dealer's  barbarities. 

•  It  was  elsewhere  hinted  (p.  86),  that  though  we  must 
keep  up  the  distinction  between  them,  it  is  nevertheless 
true  that  justice  and  beneficence  have  a  common  root,  and 
the  reader  will  now  at  once  perceive  that  the  common 
root  is — Sympathy.  All  the  actions  properly  classified 
under  the  one,  and  which  we  describe  as  fair,  equita 
ble,  upright,  spring  from  the  sympathetic  excitement  of 
the  instinct  of  personal  rights ;  whilst  those  usually 
grouped  under  the  other,  as  mercy,  charity,  good-nature, 
generosity,  amiability,  considerateness,  are  due  to  -the 
action  of  Sympathy  upon  one  or  more  of  the  other 
feelings.  J 

§  6.  In  support  of  the  foregoing  theory  much  de 
tailed  evidence  can  be  adduced.  If  it  be  true  that  men's 
perceptions  of  justice  are  generated  in  the  way  alleged,  it 
will  follow  that,  other  things  equal,  those  who  have  the 
strongest  sense  of  their  own  rights,  will  have  the  strongest 


INFLUENCE   OF   THE   SOCIETY   OF   FRIENDS.  117 

sense  of  the  rights  of  their  neighbours.  And,  by  observ 
ing  whether  this  is  the  case  or  not,  we  may  put  the  theory 
to  the  proof.  Let  us  do  this. 

The  first  illustration  that  suggests  itself  is  afforded  by 
the  Society  of  Friends.  Ever  since  they  appeared  in  the 
days  of  Charles  I.,  the  members  of  that  body  have  been 
remarkable  for  their  determined  assertion  of  personal 
liberty.  They  have  shown  it  in  their  continued  resistance 
to  ecclesiastical  power ;  in  the  obstinacy  with  which  they 
successfully  defied  persecution ;  in  their  still-continued  re 
fusal  to  pay  church-rates ;  and  even  in  their  creed,  which 
does  not  permit  a  priesthood.  Observe,  now,  how  the 
sentiment  which  these  peculiarities  imply  has  manifested 
itself  sympathetically.  Penn  and  his  followers  were  the 
only  emigrants  of  their  age  who  made  any  acknowledg 
ment  to  the  aborigines  for  the  land  they  colonized.  Of 
this  same  sect  were  the  philanthropists  who  commenced 
the  agitation  for  abolishing  the  slave-trade ;  and  who  were 
most  energetic  in  carrying  it  on.  Amongst  lunatic  asy 
lums,  the  York  Retreat  was  one  of  the  first,  if  not  the  first, 
in  which  a  non-coercive  treatment  of  the  insane  was 
adopted.  They  were  Quakers  too,  who  years  ago  began 
publicly  to  exclaim  against  the  injustice  as  well  as  the 
cruelty  of  war.  And,  whilst  it  may  be  true  that  in  busi 
ness  they  are  firm  in  the  assertion  of  their  claims,  it  is  not 
less  true  that  on  the  whole  they  are  remarkable  for  honest 
dealing. 

The  English  national  character,  as  contrasted  with  that 
of  other  races,  will  supply  a  further  illustration.  We  are 
universally,  distinguished  for  our  jealous  love  of  freedom — 
for  the  firm  maintenance  of  our  rights.  At  the  same  time 
we  are  not  less  distinguished  for  the  greater  equity  of  our 
general  conduct.  Although  our  behaviour  to  the  natives 
of  lands  on  which  we  have  settled  has  been  any  thing  but 
praiseworthy,  it  has  never  been  so  abominable  as  that  of 


118       SECONDARY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

the  Spaniards  and  others.  According  to  all  accounts  Eng 
lish  merchants  are  noted  everywhere  for  good  faith  and 
straightforwardness.  Even  amongst  the  most  brutal  of 
our  population — even  in  the  prize-ring  itself,  there  is  shown 
in  that  maxim  wThich  forbids  the  striking  of  a  man  when 
down,  a  greater  sense  of  what  is  fair  than  the  people  of 
other  countries  show.  And  during  these  latter  times,  in 
which  the  popular  demand  for  equal  political  rights  has 
been  so  loud  and  so  increasing,  we  have,  as  a  nation, 
proved  our  greater  regard  for  the  rights  of  others,  by  an 
attempt  to  put  down  slavery  all  over  the  world. 

Conversely,  we  find  that  those  who  have  not  a  strong 
sense  of  what  is  just  to  themselves,  are  likewise  deficient 
in  a  sense  of  what  is  just  to  their  fellow  men.  This  has 
long  been  a  common  remark.  As  one  of  our  living  writ 
ers  puts  it — the  tyrant  is  nothing  but  a  slave  turned  in 
side  out.  In  earlier  days,  when  feudal  lords  were  vassals 
to  the  king,  they  were  also  despots  to  their  retainers.  In 
our  own  time,  the  Russian  noble  is  alike  a  serf  to  his  auto 
crat,  and  an  autocrat  to  his  serf.  It  is  remarked  even  by 
school-boys,  that  the  bully  is  the  most  ready  of  all  to 
knock  under  to  a  bigger  bully.  We  constantly  observe 
that  those  who  fawn  upon  the  great  are  overbearing  to 
their  inferiors.  That  "  emancipated  slaves  exceed  all  other 
owners  (of  slaves)  in  cruelty  and  oppression,"  *  is  a  truth 
established  on  numerous  authorities.  And  that  where  op 
portunity  oifers  the  submissive  nature  becomes  a  tyranni 
cal  one,  is  further  illustrated  by  the  fact,  that  the  negroes 
are  frequently  caught  and  sold  by  their  own  kings. 

Thus  we  find  the  proposed  theory  to  be  supported  both 
by  direct  and  converse  evidence.  One  qualification  must 
be  made,  however.  There  is  no  necessary  connection  be 
tween  a  sense  of  what  is  due  to  self,  and  a  sense  of  what 

*  Four  Years  in  the  Pacific.     By  Lieut.  Walpolc. 


INSTINCT   OF   PERSONAL   EIGHTS.      I-  »_,  ^  J19 

is  due  to  others.  Sympathy  and  instinct  of  rights  do  not 
always  coexist  in  equal  strength  any  more  than&tjier  fac 
ulties  do.  Either  of  them  may  be  present  in  normal 
amount,  whilst  the  other  is  almost  wanting.  And,  if  de 
void  of  sympathy,  it  is  possible  for  a  man  who  has  a  suffi 
cient  impulse  to  assert  his  own  claims,  to  show  no  corre 
sponding  respect  for  the  claims  of  his  fellows.  The  instinct 
of  rights  being  of  itself  entirely  selfish,  merely  impels  its 
possessor  to  maintain  his  own  privileges.  Only  by  the 
sympathetic  excitement  of  it,  is  a  desire  to  behave  equita^ 
bly  to  others  awakened;  and  when  sympathy  is  absent 
such  a  desire  is  impossible.  Nevertheless  this  does  .not 
affect  the  general  proposition,  that  where  there  exists  the 
usual  amount  of  sympathy,  respect  for  the  rights  of  others 
will  be  great  or  small,  according  as  the  amount  of  the  in 
stinct  of  personal  rights  is  great  or  small.  And  thus  in 
the  average  of  cases,  we  may  safely  conclude  that  a  man's 
sense  of  justice  to  himself,  and  his  sense  of  justice  to  his 
neighbours,  bear  a  constant  ratio  to  each  other. 

§  7.  Further  proof  that  there  exists  the  mental  ar 
rangement  here  described,  may  be  found  in  the  fact,  that 
some  of  the  peculiar  moral  notions  traceable  to  it  are  per 
fectly  in  harmony  with  certain  of  the  abstract  conclusions 
arrived  at  in  the  preceding  chapter.  We  find  in  ourselves 
a  conviction,  for  which  we  can  give  no  satisfactory  reason, 
that  we  are  free,  if  we  please,  to  do  particular  things 
which  it  is  yet  blamable  to  do.  Though  it  may  greatly 
diminish  his  happiness,  a  man  feels  that  he  has  a  right,  if 
he  likes,  to  cut  off  a  limb,  or  to  destroy  his  property. 
Whilst  we  condemn  the  want  of  consideration  he  shows 
toward  some  miserable  debtor,  we  yet  admit  that  the 
hard  creditor  is,  in  strict  justice,  entitled  to  the  uttermost 
farthing.  Notwithstanding  our  disgust  at  the  selfishness  of 
one  who  refuses  to  afford  some  friendly  accommodation,  we 


120       SECOND AEY  DERIVATION  OF  A  FIEST  PRINCIPLE. 

cannot  deny  that  he  is  quite  at  liberty  so  to  refuse.  Now 
these  perceptions,  which,  if  the  hypothesis  be  true,  are 
referable  to  the  instinct  of  personal  rights  acting  in  the 
one  case  directly,  and  in  the  other  cases  sympathetically, 
quite  accord  with  foregoing  inferences.  We  found  that 
the  law  of  equal  freedom  was  the  fundamental  law.  We 
found  (p.  101)  that  no  other  limitations  of  activity  could 
be  as  authoritative  as  that  which  it  sets  up.  And  we 
found  further  (p.  106)  that  in  this,  our  state  of  adaptation, 
it  would  be  wrong  to  establish  any  fixed  boundary  to  the 
liberty  of  each,  save  the  similar  liberty  of  others.  Such 
a  correspondence  between  our  instinctive  beliefs,  and  the 
conclusions  previously  arrived  at,  lends  additional  proba 
bility  to  the  hypothsis  here  advanced. 

§  8.  That  there  exists  in  us  a  mental  mechanism  by 
which  the  essential  prerequisite  to  greatest  happiness  is 
recognized  and  enforced,  seems  therefore  abundantly  man 
ifest.  We  find  the  general  principles  of  our  structure  to 
imply  some  such  provision.  In  that  Moral  Sense,  of  whose 
existence  we  elsewhere  saw  the  probability,  we  have  an 
agent  apparently  answering  to  the  requirement ;  and  in 
this  first  condition  to  greatest  happiness,  we  discover  ,the 
axiom  which  the  Moral  Sense  was  to  respond  to.  That 
man  does  possess  a  feeling  which  responds  to  this  axiom, 
is  evidenced  by  the  more  or  less  complete  expression  spon 
taneously  given  to  it  in  political  dogmas,  in  laws,  and  in 
the  sayings  of  daily  life :  further  proof  of  its  existence 
being  found  in  the  fact,  that  those  who  nominally  repu 
diate  the  belief  it  gives  utterance  to,  themselves  profess 
that  belief  in  a  disguised  and  incorrect  form.  By  an  anal 
ogy  drawn  from  the  impulse  to  accumulate,  we  are  shown 
that  an  impulse  to  maintain  liberty  of  action,  is  most 
likely  essential  to  the  completeness  of  the  human  consti 
tution.  How  this  impulse  to  maintain  liberty  of  action 


BASIS    OF   THE   SENTIMENT   OF   JUSTICE.  121 

can  generate  regard  for  the  liberty  of  action  of  others,  is 
explicable  by  an  extension  of  Adam  Smith's  doctrine  of 
Sympathy;  and  that  our  sentiment  of  justice  is  really  due 
to  a  sympathetic  excitement  of  such  impulse,  numerous 
facts  conspire  to  prove.  "Lastly,  we  find  that  the  convic 
tions  originated  in  us  after  the  manner  here  supposed,  cor 
respond  with  the  results  of  abstract  reasoning,  not  only 
as  to  the  possession  by  each  of  a  right  to  exercise  his  fac 
ulties,  and  as  to  a  consequent  limit  of  that  right,  but  as  to 
the  peculiar  sacredness  of  that  right  and  this  limit. 


CHAPTER    VI. 

FIRST   PRINCIPLE. 

§  1.  Thus  are  we  brought  by  several  routes  to  the 
same  conclusion.  Whether  we  reason  our  way  from  those 
fixed  conditions  under  which  only  the  Divine  Idea — great 
est  happiness,  can  be  realized — whether  we  draw  our  in 
ferences  from  man's  constitution,  considering  him  as  a 
congeries  of  faculties — or  whether  we  listen  to  the  moni 
tions  of  a  certain  mental  agency,  which  seems  to  have  the 
function  of  guiding  us  in  this  matter,  we  are  alike  taught 
as  the  law  of  right  social  relationships,  that — Every  man 
has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes 
not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man.  Though  fur 
ther  qualifications  of  the  liberty  of  action  thus  asserted 
may  be  necessary,  yet  we  have  seen  (p.  106)  that  in  the 
just  regulation  of  a  community  no  further  qualifications 
of  it  can  be  recognized.  Such  further  qualifications  must 
ever  remain  for  private  and  individual  application.  We 
must  therefore  adopt  this  law  of  equal  freedom  in  its  en- 
6 


122  FIRST  PRINCIPLE. 

tirety,  as  the  law  on  which  a  correct  system  of  equity  is 
to  be  based. 

§  2.  Some  will,  perhaps,  object  to  this  first  princi 
ple,  that  being  in  the  nature  of  an  axiomatic  truth — stand 
ing  toward  the  inferences  to  be  drawn  from  it  in  the  posi 
tion  of  one,  it  ought  to  be  recognizable  by  all ;  which  it 
is  not. 

Respecting  the  fact  thus  alleged,  that  there  have  been, 
and  are,  men  impervious  to  this  first  principle,  there  can 
be  no  question.  Probably  it  would  have  been  dissented 
from  by  Aristotle,  who  considered  it  a  "  self-evident  max 
im  that  nature  intended  barbarians  to  be  slaves."  Car 
dinal  Julian,  who  "  abhorred  the  impiety  of  keeping  faith 
with  infidels,"  might  possibly  have  disputed  it.  It  is  a 
doctrine  which  would  scarcely  have  suited  the  abbot  Gui- 
bert,'  who,  in  his  sermons,  called  the  free  cities  of  France 
"  those  execrable  communities,  where  serfs,  against  law 
and  justice,  withdraw  themselves  from  the  power  of  their 
lords."  And  perhaps  the  Highlanders,  who  in  1748  were 
reluctant  to  receive  their  freedom  on  the  abolition  of  the 
heritable  jurisdictions,  would  not  have  admitted  it.  But 
the  confession  that  the  truth  of  this  first  principle  is 
not  self-evident  to  all,  by  no  means  invalidates  it.  The 
Bushman  can  only  count  as  high  as  three ;  yet  arithme 
tic  is  a  fact :  and  we  have  got  a  Calculus  of  Functions 
by  the  aid  of  which  we  find  new  planets.  As,  then,  the 
disability  of  the  savage  to  perceive  the  elementary  truths 
of  number  is  no  argument  against  their  existence,  and  no 
obstacle  to  their  discovery  and  development,  so,  the  cir 
cumstance  that  some  do  not  see  the  law  of  equal  freedom 
to  be  an  elementary  truth  of  ethics,  does  not  prevent  its 
being  one. 

So  far  indeed  is  this  difference  in  men's  moral  percep 
tions  from  being  a  difficulty  in  our  way,  that  it  serves  to 


NOT   UNIVERSALLY   RECOGNIZED.  123 

illustrate  a  doctrine  already  set  forth.  As  explained  in 
Chapter  II.,  man's  original  circumstances  "required  that 
he  should  sacrifice  the  welfare  of  other  beings  to  his  own;" 
whereas  his  present  circumstances  require  that  "  each  indi 
vidual  shall  have  such  desires  only  as  may  be  fully  satis 
fied  without  trenching  upon  the  ability  of  other  individ 
uals  to  obtain  like  satisfaction."  And  it  was  pointed  out 
that,  in  virtue  of  the  law  of  adaptation,  the  human  con 
stitution  is  changing  from  the  form  that  fitted  it  to  the 
first  set  of  conditions  to  a  form  fitting  it  for  the  last. 
Now  it  is  by  the  growth  of  those  tAVO  faculties  which  to 
gether  originate  what  we  term  a  Moral  Sense,  that  fitness 
for  these  last  conditions  is  secured.  In  proportion  to  the 
strengths  of  sympathy,  and  the  instinct  of  personal  rights, 
will  be  the  impulse  to  conform  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 
And  in  the  mode  elsewhere  shown  (p.  38),  the  impulse  to 
conform  to  this  law  will  generate  a  correlative  belief  in 
it.  Only,  therefore,  after  the  process  of  adaptation  has 
made  considerable  advance,  can  there  arise  either  subordi 
nation  to  this  law,  or  a  perception  of  its  truth.  And 
hence  any  general  recognition  of  it  during  the  earlier 
stages  of  social  development  must  not  be  looked  for. 

§  3.  To  the  direct  evidence  that  has  been  accumu 
lated  in  proof  of  our  first  principle,  may  now,  however, 
be  added  abundant  indirect  evidence  furnished  by  the  ab 
surdities  into  which  a  denial  of  it  betrays  us.  He  who 
asserts  that  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  not  true,  that  is, 
he  who  asserts  that  men  have  not  equal  rights,  has  two 
alternatives.  He  may  either  say  that  men  have  no  rights 
at  all/or  that  they  have  unequal  rights.  Let  us  examine 
these  positions. 

Foremost  of  those  who  deny_  rights  altogether,  stands 
that  same  Sir  Robert  Filmer  already  named,  with  his 
dogma,  that  "  men  are  not  naturally  free."  Starting  thus, 


124  FIKST   PRINCIPLE. 

he  readily  finds  his  way  to  the  conclusion,  that  the  only 
proper  form  of  government  is  an  absolute  monarchy.  For, 
if  men  are  not  naturally  free,  that  is,  if  men  have  natur 
ally  no  rights,  then,  he  only  has  rights  to  whom  they  are 
specially  given  by  God.  From  which  inference  to  "  the 
divine  right  of  kings "  is  an  easy  step.  It  has  become 
very  manifest  in  later  times,  however,  that  this  divine 
right  of  kingspneans  the  divine  right  of  any  one  who  can 
get  uppermost.  For  since,  according  to  its  assertors,  no 
man  can  be  supposed  to  occupy  the  position  of  supreme 
ruler  in  opposition  to  the  will  of  the  Deity,  it  follows  that 
whoever  attains  to  that  position,  whether  by  fair  means 
or  by  foul,  be  he  legitimate  or  be  he  usurper,  has  Divine 
authority  on  his  side.  So  that  to  say  "  men  are  not  natur 
ally  free,"  is  to  say  that  though  men  have  no  rights,  yet 
whoever  can  get  power  to  coerce  the  rest  has  a  right  to 
do  so ! 

§  4.  But  this  doctrine  betrays  its  supporters  into  a 
still  more  serious  dilemma.  On  referring  back  to  Chapter 
IV.,  we  shall  find  that  the  denial  of  rights  amounts  to  a 
libel  on  the  Deity.  For,  as  we  there  saw,  that  which  a 
man  has  a  right  to,  is  that  which  God  intended  for  him. 
And  to  say  that  man  has  no  right  to  freedom  of  action,  is 
to  say  that  God  did  not  mean  him  to  have  it.  Without 
freedom  of  action,  however,  man  cannot  fulfil  his  desires. 
Then  God  willed  that  he  should  not  fulfil  them.  But  the 
non-fulfilment  of  the  desires  produces  misery.  Therefore, 
God  intended  that  he  should  be  miserable.  By  which  ab 
surdity  we  may  safely  consider  the  position  disproved. 

§  5.  For  espousing  the  other  alternative,  namely, 
that  men's  rights  are  unequal,  no  conceivable  motive  can 
be  assigned  but  a  desire  to  ensure  the  supremacy  of  the 
best/ ''There  are  not  a  few  good  sort  of  people  who  com- 


DEFENCE   OF   CONVENTIONAL  DISTINCTIONS.  125 

monly  reply  to  strictures  upon  social  inequalities  by  quot 
ing  that  couplet,  which,  beginning  with  the  postulate — 
"  Order  is  heaven's  first  law,"  ends  with  the  inference — 
"  Some  are,  and  must  be,  greater  than  the  rest."  And  on 
this  maxim,  with  ludicrous  inconsistency,  they  found  a 
defence  of  conventional  distinctions.  Not  daring  to  trust 
"  heaven's  first  law  "  to  itself,  they  wish  to  help  it  by  arti 
ficial  classification.  They  fear  that  the  desired  "  order " 
will  not  be  maintained  unless  it  is  looked  after ;  and  so 
these  "  greater  than  the  rest "  are  picked  out  by  official 
divination ;  ranged  in  tiers ;  and  ticketed  with  their  re 
spective  values.  / 

These  people,  and  others  akin  to  them,  who  hold  that 
rights  are  unequal,  belong  to  that  large  class  who  believe 
in  nothing  but  externals — who  can  recognize  no  forces  but 
those  of  prescription — votes,  authority,  rank,  and  the  like 
— who  "  adore  an  institution,  and  do  not  see  that  it  is 
founded  on  a  thought."  A  modicum  of  penetration,  how 
ever,  would  show  them  that  the  great  need  none  of  this 
patronage  at  their  hands.  Real  superiority  will  assert  it 
self  without  factitious  aid.  Do  away  with  disturbing  ar 
rangements,  and,  just  in  proportion  to  the  force  resident 
in  each,  will  be  the  influence  each  exercises  upon  the  rest. 
Allow  things  to  take  their  natural  course,  and  if  a  man 
have  in  him  that  which  transcends  the  common,  it  must 
eventually  draw  to  itself  respect  and  obedience. 

§  6.  But  even  were  it  admitted  that,  to  ensure 
supremacy  of  the~best,  liberty  of  action  should  apportioned 
out  to  men  in  the  ratio  of  their  merits,  the  maintainers  of 
unequal  rights  would  be  none  the  forwarder ;  for  there  re 
mains  the  question — how  are  relative  merits  to  be  deter 
mined  ?  Where  are  the  standards  by  which  we  may  test 
the  respective  values  of  different  kinds  and  degrees  of 
ability  ?  We  cannot  appeal  to  public  opinion,  for  it  is  not 


126  FIRST   PRINCIPLE. 

uniform.  And  were  it  uniform,  there  is  no  reason  to  think 
that  it  would  be  correct.  On  the  contrary,  if  any  thing  is 
to  be  gathered  from  surrounding  facts,  very  erroneous 
estimates  would  be  formed  by  it.  ~~f  Can  confidence  be 
placed  in  the  judgments  of  men  who  subscribe  Hudson- 
testimonials,  and  yet  leave  the  original  projector  of  rail 
ways  to  die  in  poverty  ?  Are  those  fit  to  decide  upon 
comparative  greatness  who  ornament  their  drawing-room 
tables  with  a  copy  of  Burke' s  Peerage ;  who  read  though 
the  lists  of  court  presentations,,  and  gossip  about  the 
movements  the  haut  ton — people  who  w^ould  trace  back 
their  lineage  to  some  bandit  baron — some  Front-de-bceuf, 
rather  than  to  a  Watt  or  an  Arkwright  ?  Is  any  depend 
ence  to  be  placed  on  the  decision  of  an  authority  which 
has  erected  half-a-dozen  public  monuments  to  its  Welling 
ton,  and  none  to  its  Shakspeare,  its  Newton,  or  its  Bacon  ? 
— an  authority  that  awards  to  the  doorkeeper  of  its 
House  of  Commons  £74  a  year  more  than  to  its  astrono 
mer  royal  ?  According  to  Johnson,  "  the  chief  glory  of 
every  people  arises  from  its  authors : "  yet  our  literary 
men  are  less  honoured  than  people  of  title ;  the  writers  of 
our  leading  journals  are  unknown  ;  and  we  see  much  more 
respect  shown  to  a  Rothschild  or  a  Baring  than  to  our 
Faradays  and  our  Owens. 

If,  then,  public  opinion  is  so  fallible  a  test  of  relative 
merits,  where  shall  a  trustworthy  test  be  found  ?  Mani 
festly,  if  the  freedom  to  which  each  is  entitled  varies  with 
his  worth,  some  satisfactory  mode  of  estimating  worth 
must  be  discovered  before  any  settlement  of  men's  right 
relationships  can  become  possible.  Who  now  will  point 
out  such  a  mode  ? 

§  7.  Even  were  a  still  further  admission  made — 
even  were  we  to  assume  that  men's  respective  claims 
could  be  fairly  rated — it  would  still  be  impossible  to  re- 


THEOEY   OF   UNEQUAL    EIGHTS.  127 

duce  the  theory,  (if  unequal  rights  to  practice.  We  should 
yet  have  to  find  a  rule  by  which  to  allot  these  different 
shares  of  privilege.  Where  is  the  scale  that  would  enable 
us  to  mark  off  the  portion  proper  for  each  individual  ? 
What  unit  of  measure  must  be  used  for  this  kind  of  divis 
ion  ?  Supposing  a  shopkeeper's  rights  to  be  symbolized 
by  ten  and  a  fraction,  what  number  will  represent  those 
of  a  doctor  ?  What  multiple  are  the  liberties  of  a  banker, 
of  those  of  a  seamstress  ?  Given  two  artists,  one  half  as 
clever  again  as  the  other,  it  is  required  to  find  the  limits 
within  which  each  may  exercise  his  faculties.  As  the 
greatness  of  a  prime  minister  is  to  that  of  a  ploughboy,  so 
is  full  freedom  of  action  to — the  desired  answer.  Here 
are  a  few  out  of  numberless  like  questions.  When 
a  method  for  their  solution  has  been  found,  it  will 
be  time  enough  to  reconsider  the  theory  of  unequal 
rights. 

§  8.  Thus  to  the  several  positive  reasons  for  affirm 
ing  that  every  man  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills, 
provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other 
man,  we  must  now  add  the  foregoing  negative  ones. 
Neither  of  the  alternatives,  to  which  the  rejection  of  this 
first  principle  leaves  us,  is  acceptable.  -  The  doctrine  that 
men  have  naturally  no  rights  leads  to  the  awkward  infer 
ences,  that  might  makes  right,  and  that  the  Deity  is  a 
malevolent  being.  Whilst  to  say  that  men  have  unequal 
rights  is  to  assume  two  impossibilities ;  namely,  that  we 
are  able  to  determine  the  ratios  of  men's  merits ;  and  hav 
ing  done  this,  to  assign  to  each  his  due  proportion  of 
privilege. 


128  APPLICATION   OF   THE   FIEST   PKINCIPLE. 

CHAPTEE   VII. 

APPLICATION    OF   THIS   FIEST   PRINCIPLE. 

§  1.  The  process  by  which  we  may  develop  this  first 
principle  into  a  system  of  equity,  is  sufficiently  obvious. 
We  have  just  to  distinguish  the  actions  that  are  included 
under  its  permit,  from  those  which  are  excluded  by  it — to 
find  what  lies  inside  the  sphere  appointed  for  each  individ- 
}  ual,  and  what  outside.  Our  aim  must  be  to  discover  how 
'  far  the  territory  of  may  extends,  and  where  it  borders 
upon  that  of  may  not.  We  shall  have  to  consider  of  every 
deed,  whether,  in  committing  it,  a  man  does,  or  does  not, 
trespass  upon  the  ordained  freedom  of  his  neighbour — 
whether,  when  placed  side  by  side,  the  shares  of  liberty 
the  two  parties  respectively  assume  are  equal.  And  by 
thus  separating  that  which  can  be  done  by  each  without 
trenching  on  the  privileges  of  others,  from  that  which  can 
not  be  so  done,  we  may  classify  actions  into  lawful  and 
unlawful. 

§  2.  Difficulties  may  now  and  then  occur  in  the  per 
formance  of  this  process.  We  shall,  perhaps,  occasionally 
find  ourselves  unable  to  decide  whether  a  given  action 
does  or  does  not  trespass  against  the  law  of  equal  free 
dom.  But  such  an  admission  by  no  means  implies  any 
defect  in  that  law.  It  merely  implies  human  incapacity 
— an  incapacity  which  puts  a  limit  to  our  discovery  of 
physical  as  well  as  of  moral  truth.  It  is,  for  instance, 
quite  beyond  the  power  of  any  mathematician  to  state  in 
degrees  and  minutes,  the  angle  at  which  a  man  may  lean 
without  falling.  Not  being  able  to  find  accurately  the 
centre  of  gravity  of  a  man's  body  he  cannot  say  with 


CONCLUSIONS   DEDUCED   FEOM   IT.  129 

certainty  whether,  at  a  given  inclination,  the  line  of  direc 
tion  will  or  will  not  fall  outside  the  base.  But  we  do  not, 
therefore,  take  exception  to  the  first  principles  of  mechan 
ics.  We  know  that,  in  spite  of  our  inability  to  follow  out 
those  first  principles  to  all  their  consequences,  the  stability 
or  instability  of  a  man's  attitude  might  still  be  accurately 
determined  by  them,  were  our  perceptions  competent  to 
take  in  all  the  .  conditions  of  such  a  problem.  Similarly, 
it  is  argued  that,  although  there  may  possibly  arise  out 
of  the  more  complex  social  relationships,  questions  that 
are  apparently  not  soluble  by  comparing  the  respective 
amounts  of  freedom  the  concerned  parties  assume,  it  must 
nevertheless  be  granted  that,  whether  we  see  it  or  not, 
their  claims  are  either  equal  or  unequal,  and  the  depend 
ent  actions  right  or  wrong  accordingly. 

§  3.  For  those  who  have  faith  in  the  abstract,  and 
who  dare  to  follow  wherever  an  acknowledged  doctrine 
may  lead,  it  will  be  sufficient  to  point  out  the  several  con 
clusions  which  may  be  drawn  from  this  first  principle, 
and  to  leave  those  conclusions  to  stand  or  fall  by  the  logi- 
calness  of  their  deduction.  It  is  to  be  feared,  however, 
that  results  arrived  at  by  so  purely  philosophical  a  process, 
will  weigh  but  little  with  the  majority.  People  who 
"  cannot  understand  a  principle  until  its  light  falls  upon  a 
fact,"  are  not  to  be  swayed  by  inferences  so  deduced. 
Wedded  as  they  are  to  the  guidance  of  a  superficial  ex 
perience,  they  are  deaf  to  the  enunciation  of  those  laAvs, 
of  which  the  complex  phenomena  they  draw  their  ex 
perience  from  are  the  workings  out.  We  have,  neverthe 
less,  to  deal  with  such  as  best  we  may ;  and,  to  meet  their 
case,  evidence  of  a  so-called  "  practical "  nature  must  be 
adduced.  Whenever,  therefore,  we  arrive  at  inferences 
conflicting  with  the  general  opinion,  it  is  intended  to  fol- 
6* 


130         THE  EIGHTS  OF  LIFE  AND  PEESONAL  LIBEETY. 

low   up   the   argument  by  showing    that   "experience," 
rightly  interpreted,  enforces  these  inferences. 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

THE   EIGHTS    OF   LIFE    AND   PEESONAL   LIBEETY. 

§  1.  These  are  such  self-evident  corollaries  from  our 
first  principle  as  scarcely  to  need  a  separate  statement. 
If  every  man  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided 
he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man,  it  is 
manifest  that  he  has  a  claim  to  his  life :  for  without  it  he 
can  do  nothing  that  he  has  willed ;  and  to  his  personal 
liberty :  for^he  withdrawal  of  it  partially,  if  not  wholly, 
restrains  him  from  the  fulfilment  of  his  will.  It  is  just  as 
clear,  too,  that  each  man  is  forbidden  to  deprive  his 
fellow  of  life  or  liberty :  inasmuch  as  he  cannot  do  this 
without  breaking  the  law,  which,  in  asserting  his  freedom, 
declares  that  he  shall  not  infringe  "  the  equal  freedom 
of  any  other."  For  he  who  is  killed  or  enslaved  is 
obviously  no  longer  equally  free  with  his  killer  or  en 
slaver. 

§  2.  It  is  unnecessary  to  commend  these  conclusions 
by  any  exposition  of  advantages.  All  spontaneously  as 
sent  to  them.  There  are  a  few  simple  truths  of  which 
the  moral  sense  gives  a  sufficiently  clear  perception  with 
out  the  aid  of  logic ;  and  these  are  of  the  number.  The 
time  was,  indeed,  when  the  law  of  adaptation  having  as 
yet  produced  but  little  effect,  the  feelings  that  respond  to 
these  truths  were  comparatively  undeveloped,  and  conse 
quently  produced  no  spontaneous  recognition  of  them. 
And  did  we  live  in  the  old  Assyrian  days  when  a  subject 


INTUITIVELY   EECOGNIZED.  131 

was  the  property  of  his  king; — were  it  our  custom  to  chain 
a  porter  to  his  cell  on  one  side  of  the  door,  opposite  to  the 
kennel  of  the  house-dog  on  the  other,  as  in  Athens  and 
Rome — did  we  sacrifice  men  to  the  gods,  or  send  our  pris 
oners  of  war  to  be  torn  to  pieces  in  an  amphitheatre,  it 
might  be  needful  to  enforce  the  doctrines  here  enunciated, 
by  showing  the  expediency  of  acting  upon  them.  But 
happily  we  live  in  better  times ;  and  may  congratulate 
ourselves  on  having  reached  a  phase  of  civilization,  in 
which  the  rights  of  life  and  personal  liberty  no  longer  re 
quire  inculcating. 

§  3.  Into  such  questions  as  the  punishment  of  death, 
the  perpetual  imprisonment  of  criminals,  and  the  like,  we 
cannot  here  enter.  These  implying,  as  they  do,  antecedent 
infractions  of  the  law,  and  being,  as  they  are,  remedial 
measures  for  a  diseased  moral  state,  belong  to  what  has 
been  elsewhere  termed  Therapeutical  Ethics,  with  which 
we  have  now  nothing  to  do. 


CHAPTEE   IX. 

THE   EIGHT   TO   THE    USE    OF   THE    EAETH. 

§  1.  Given  a  race  of  beings  having  like  claims  to 
pursue  the  objects  of  their  desires — given  a  world  adapted 
to  the  gratification  of  those  desires — a  world  into  which 
such  beings  are  similarly  born,  and  it  unavoidably  follows 
that  they  have  equal  rights  to  the  use  of  this  world.  For 
if  each  of  them  "  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills  provid 
ed  he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other,"  then 
each  of  them  is  free  to  use  the  earth  for  the  satisfaction  of 
nis  wants,  provided  he  allows  all  others  the  same  liberty. 


132  THE   EIGHT   TO   THE    USE   OF   THE    EARTH. 

And  conversely,  it  is  manifest  that  no  one,  or  part  of  them, 
may  use  the  earth  in  such  a  way  as  to  prevent  the  rest 
from  similarly  using  it ;  seeing  that  to  do  this  is  to  assume 
greater  freedom  than  the  rest,  and  consequently  to  break 
the  law.  ^  / 


2.  Equity,  therefore,  does  not  permit  property  in 
land.  For  if  one  portion  of  the  earth's  surface  may  justly 
Become  the  possession  of  an  individual,  and  may  be  held 
by  him  for  his  sole  use  and  benefit,  as  a  thing  to  which  he 
has  an  exclusive  right,  then  other  portions  of  the  earth's 
surface  may  be  so  held ;  and  eventually  the  whole  of  the 
earth's  surface  may  be  so  held  ;  and  our  planet  may  thus 
lapse  altogether  into  private  hands.  Observe  now  the 
dilemma  to  which  this  leads.  Supposing  the  entire  habita 
ble  globe  to  be  so  enclosed,  it  follows  that  if  the  land 
owners  have  a  valid  right  to  its  surface,  all  who  are  not 
landowners,  have  no  right  at  all  to  its  surface.  Hence, 
such  can  exist  on  the  earth  by  sufferance  only.  They  are 
alljfcrespassers.  Save  by  the  permission  of  the  lords  of  the 
soil,  they  can  have  no  room  for  the  soles  of  their  feet. 
Nay,  should  the  others  think  fit  to  deny  them  a  resting- 
place,  these  landless  men  might  equitably  be  expelled 
from  the  earth  altogether.  If,  then,  the  assumption  that 
land  can  be  held  as  property,  involves  that  the  whole 
globe  may  become  the  private  domain  of  a  part  of  its 
inhabitants  ;  and  if,  by  consequence,  the  rest  of  its  inhab 
itants  can  then  exercise  their  faculties — can  then  exist 
even — only  by  consent  of  the  landowners;  it  is  mani 
fest,  that  an  exclusive  possession  of  the  soil  necessitates 
an  infringement  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom.  For,  men 
who  cannot  "  live  and  move  and  have  their  being " 
without  the  leave  of  others,  cannot  be  equally  free  with 
those  others. 


PKOPEETY    IN    LAND.  133 

§  3.  Passing  from  the  consideration  of  the  possible, 
to  that  of  the  actual,  we  find  yet  further  reason  to  deny 
the . jtectitu.de  of  property  in  land.  It  can  never  be  pre 
tended  that  the  existing  titles  to  such  property  are  legiti 
mate.  Should  any  one  think  so,  let  him  look  in  the 
chronicles.  Violence,  fraud,  the  prerogative  of  force,  the 
claims  of  superior  cunning — these  are  the  sources  to  which 
those  titles  may  be  traced.  The  original  deeds  were 
written  with  the  sword,  rather  than  with  the  pen :  not 
lawyers,  but  soldiers,  were  the  conveyancers  :  blows  were 
the  current  coin  given  in  payment ;  and  for  seals,  blood 
was  used  in  preference  to  wax.  Could  valid  claims  be 
thus  constituted  ?  Hardly.  "<And  if  not,  what  becomes 
of  the  pretensions  of  all  subsequent  holders  of  estates  so 
obtained  ?  Does  sale  or  bequest  generate  a  right  where 
it  did  not  previously  exist  ?  Would  the  original  claim 
ants  be  nonsuited  at  the  bar  of  reason,  because  the  thing 
stolen  from  them  had  changed  hands  ?  Certainly  not. 
And  if  one  act  of  transfer  can  give  no  title,  can  many? 
No :  though  nothing  be  multiplied  forever,  it  will  not 
produce  one.  Even  the  law  recognizes  this  principle. 
An  existing  holder  must,  if  called  upon,  substantiate  the 
claims  of  those  from  whom  he  purchased  or  inherited  his 
property ;  and  any  flaw  in  the  original  parchment,  even 
though  the  property  should  have  had  a  score  intermediate 
owners,  quashes  his  right. 

"  But  Time,"  say  some,  "  is  a  great  legalizer.  _  Imme 
morial  possession  must  be  taken  to  constitute  a  legitimate 
claim.  That  which  has  been  held  from  age  to  age  as  pri 
vate  property,  and  has  been  bought  and  sold  as  such, 
must  now  be  considered  as  irrevocably  belonging  to  indi 
viduals."  To  which  proposition  a  willing  assent  shall  bj3 
given  when  its  propounders  can  assign  it  a  definite  mean 
ing.  To  do  this,  however,  they  must  find  satisfactory 
answers  to  such  questions  as,  How  long  does  it  take  for 


134  THE   EIGHT   TO   THE   USE   OF   THE   EAETH. 

what  was  originally  a  wrong  to  grow  into  a  right  ?  At 
what  rate  per  annum  do  invalid  claims  become  valid  ?  If 
a  title  gets  perfect  in  a  thousand  years,  how  much  more 
than  perfect  will  it  be  in  two  thousand  years  ?^and  so 
forth.  For  the  solution  of  which  they  will  require  a  new 
calculus. 

Whether  it  may  be  expedient  to  admit  claims  of  a  cer 
tain  standing,  is  not  the  point.  We  have  here  nothing  to 
to  do  with  considerations  of  conventional  privilege  or  legis 
lative  convenience.  We  have  simply  to  inquire  what  is 
the  verdict  given  by  pure  equity  in  the  matter.  And  this 
verdict  enjoins  a  protest  against  every  existing  pretension 
to  the  individual  possession  of  the  soil ;  and  dictates  the 
assertion,  that  the  right  of  mankind  at  large  to  the  earth's 
surface  is  still  valid ;  all  deeds,  customs,  and  laws  not 
withstanding. 

§  4.  Not  only  have  present  land  tenures  an  indefens 
ible  origin,  but  it  is  impossible  to  discover  any  mode  in 
which  land  can  become  private  property.  Cultivation  is 
commonly  considered  to  give  a  legitimate  title.  He  who 
has  reclaimed  a  tract  of  ground  from  its  primitive  wild- 
ness,  is  supposed  to  have  thereby  made  it  his  own. 
But  if  his  right  is  disputed,  by  what  system  of  logic 
can  he  vindicate  it  ?  Let  us  listen  a  moment  to  his 
pleadings. 

"  Hallo,  you  Sir,"  cries  the  cosmopolite  to  some  back 
woodsman,  smoking  at  the  door  of  his  shanty,  "  by  what 
authority  do  you  take  possession  of  these  acres  that  you 
have  cleared ;  round  which  you  have  put  up  a  snake-fence, 
and  on  which  you  have  built  this  log-house  ?  " 

"  By  what  authority  ?  I  squatted  here  because  there 
was  no  one  to  say  nay — because  I  was  as  much  at  liberty 
to  do  so  as  any  other  man.  Besides,  now  that  I  have  cut 
down  the  wood,  and  ploughed  and  cropped  the  ground, 


135 

this  farm  is  more  mine  than  yours,  or  anybody's ;  and  I 
mean  to  keep  it." 

"  Ay,  so  you  all  say.  But  I  do  not  yet  see  how  you 
have  substantiated  your  claim.  When  you  came  here  you 
found  the  land  producing  trees — sugar-maples,  perhaps ; 
or  may  be  it  was  covered  with  prairie-grass  and  wild 
strawberries.  Well,  instead  of  these  you  made  it  yield 
wheat,  or  maize,  or  tobacco.  Now  I  want  to  understand 
how,  by  exterminating  one  set  of  plants,  and  making  the 
soil  bear  another  set  in  their  place,  you  have  constituted 
yourself  lord  of  this  soil  for  all  succeeding  time." 

"  Oh,  those  natural  products  which  I  destroyed  were 
of  little  or  no  use ;  whereas  I  caused  the  earth  to  bring 
forth  things  good  for  food — things  that  help  to  give  life 
and  happiness." 

"  Still  you  have  not  shown  why  such  a  process  makes 
the  portion  of  earth  you  have  so  modified  yours.  What 
is  it  that  you  have  done  ?  You  have  turned  over  the  soil 
to  a  few  inches  in  depth  with  a  spade  or  a  plough ;  you 
have  scattered  over  this  prepared  surface  a  few  seeds ;  and 
you  have  gathered  the  fruits  which  the  sun,  rain,  and  air, 
helped  the  soil  to  produce.  Just  tell  me,  if  you  please, 
by  what  magic  have  these  acts  made  you  sole  owner  of 
that  vast  mass  of  matter,  having  for  its  base  the  surface 
of  your  estate,  and  for  its  apex  the  centre  of  the  globe  ? 
all  of  which  it  appears  you  would  monopolize  to  yourself 
and  your  descendants  forever." 

"  Well,  if  it  isn't  mine,  whose  is  it  ?  I  have  dispos 
sessed  nobody.  When  I  crossed  the  Mississippi  yonder,  I 
found  nothing  but  the  silent  woods.  If  some  one  else  had 
settled  here,  and  made  this  clearing,  he  would  have  had 
as  good  a  right  to  the  location  as  I  have.  I  have  done 
nothing  but  what  any  other  person  was  at  liberty  to  do 
had  he  come  before  me.  Whilst  they  were  unreclaimed, 
these  lands  belonged  to  all  men — as  much  to  one  as  to 


136  THE   EIGHT   TO   THE   USE   OF   THE   EAKTH. 

another — and  they  are  now  mine  simply  because  I  was  the 
first  to  discover  and  improve  them." 

"  You  say  truly,  when  you  say  that  '  whilst  they  were 
unreclaimed  these  lands  belonged  to  all  men.'  And  it  is 
my  duty  to  tell  you  that  they  belong  to  all  men  still ;  and 
that  your  '  improvements '  as  you  call  them,  cannot  vitiate 
the  claim,  of  all  men.  You  may  plough  and  harrow, 
and  sow  and  reap ;  you  may  turn  over  the  soil  as  often 
as  you  like ;  but  all  your  manipulations  will  fail  to  make 
that  soil  yours,  which  was  not  yours  to  begin  with.  Let 
me  put  a  case.  Suppose  now  that  in  the  course  of  your 
wanderings  you  come  upon  an  empty  house,  which  in 
spite  of  its  dilapidated  state  takes  your  fancy ;  suppose 
that  with  the  intention  of  making  it  your  abode  you  ex 
pend  much  time  and  trouble  in  repairing  it- — that  you 
paint  and  paper,  and  whitewash,  and  at  considerable  cost 
bring  it  into  a  habitable  state.  Suppose  further,  that  on 
some  fatal  day  a  stranger  is  announced,  who  turns  out  to 
be  the  heir  to  whom  this  house  has  been  bequeathed ;  and 
that  this  professed  heir  is  prepared  with  all  the  necessary 
proofs  of  his  identity ;  what  becomes  of  your  improve 
ments  ?  Do  they  give  you  a  valid  title  to  the  house  ? 
Do  they  quash  the  title  of  the  original  claimant  ?  " 

"  No." 

"  ^either  then  do  your  pioneering  operations  give  you 
a  valid  title  to  this  land.  Neither  do  they  quash  the  title 
of  its  original  claimants — the  human  race.  The  world  is 
God's  bequest  to  mankind.  All  men  are  joint  heirs  to  it ; 
you  amongst  the  number.  And  because  you  have  taken 
up  your  residence  on  a  certain  part  of  it,  and  have  sub 
dued,  cultivated,  beautified  that  part — improved  it  as  you 
say,  you  are  not  therefore  warranted  in  appropriating  it 
as  entirely  private  property.  At  least  if  you  do  so,  you 
may  at  any  moment  be  justly  expelled  by  the  lawful 
owner — Society." 


SOCIETY   ITS   TRUE   OWNEE.  137 

lj  but  surely  you  would  not  eject  me  without 
making  some  recompense  for  the  great  additional  value  I 
have  given  to  this  tract,  by  reducing  what  was  a  wilder 
ness  into  fertile  fields.  You  would  not  turn  me  adrift  and 
deprive  me  of  all  the  benefit  of  those  years  of  toil  it  has 
cost  me  to  bring  this  spot  into  its  present  state." 

X'Of  course  not :  just  as  in  the  case  of  the  house,  you 
wo"uld  have  an  equitable  title  to  compensation  from  the 
proprietor  for  repairs  and  new  fittings,  so  the  community 
cannot  justly  take  possession  of  this  estate,  without  pay 
ing  for  all  that  you  have  done  to  it.  This  extra  worth 
which  your  labour  has  imparted  to  it  is  fairly  yours ;  and 
although  you  have,  without  leave,  busied  yourself  in  bet 
tering  what  belongs  to  the  community,  yet  no  doubt  the 
community  will  duly  discharge  your  claim.  But  admit 
ting  this,  is  quite  a  different  thing  from  recognizing  your 
right  to  the  land  itself.  It  may  be  true  that  you  are  en 
titled  to  compensation  for  the  improvements  this  enclosure 
has  received  at  your  hands ;  and  at  the  same  time  it  may 
be  equally  true  that  no  act,  form,  proceeding,  or  ceremony, 
can  make  this  enclosure  your  private  property." 

§  5.  It  does  indeed  at  first  sight  seem  possible  for 
the  earth  to  become  the  exclusive  possession  of  individuals 
by  some  process  of  equitable  distribution.  "Why,"  it 
may  be  asked,  "  should  not  men  agree  to  a  fair  subdivis 
ion  ?  If  all  are  co-heirs,  why  may  not  the  estate  be  equally 
apportioned,  and  each  be  afterwards  perfect  master  of  his 
own  share  ?  " 

To  this  question  it  may  in  the  first  place  be  replied, 
that  such  a  division  is  vetoed  by  the  difficulty  of  fixing 
the  values  of  respective  tracts  of  land.  Variations  in 
productiveness,  different  degrees  of  accessibility,  advan 
tages  of  climate,  proximity  to  the  centres  of  civilization — 
these,  and  other  such  considerations,  remove  the  problem 


138  THE   EIGHT   TO   THE   USE   OF   THE   EARTH. 

out  of  the  sphere  of  mere  mensuration  into  the  region  of 
impossibility. 

But,  waiving  this,  let  us  inquire  who  are  to  be  the  al 
lottees.  Shall  adult  males,  and  all  who  have  reached 
twenty-one  on  a  specified  day,  be  the  fortunate  individ 
uals  ?  If  so,  what  is  to  be  done  with  those  who  come  of 
age  on  the  morrow  ?  Is  it  proposed  that  each  man,  wo 
man,  and  child,  shall  have  a  section?  If  so,  what  be 
comes  of  all  who  are  to  be  born  next  year  ?  And  what 
will  be  the  fate  of  those  whose  fathers  sell  their  estates 
and  squanders  the  proceeds  ?  These  portionless  ones  must 
constitute  a  class  already  described  as  having  no  right  to 
a  resting-place  on  earth — as  living  by  the  sufferance  of 
their  fellow-men — as  being  practically  serfs.  And  the  ex 
istence  of  such  a  class  is  wholly  at  variance  with  the  law 
of  equal  freedom. 

£.  Until,  therefore,  we  can  produce  a  valid  commission 
authorizing  us  to  make  this  distribution — until  it  can  be 
proved  that  God  has  given  one  charter  of  privileges  to 
one  generation,  and  another  to  the  next — until  we  can 
demonstrate  that  men  born  after  a  certain  date  are  doomed 
to  slavery,  we  mus4  consider  that  no  such  allotment  is 
permissible. 

§  6.  Probably  some  will  regard  the  difficulties  in 
separable  from  individual  ownership  of  the  soil,  as  caused 
by  pushing  to  excess  a  doctrine  applicable  only  within 
rational  limits.  This  is  a  very  favourite  style  of  thinking 
with  some.  There  are  people  who  hate  any  thing  in  the 
shape  of  exact  conclusions ;  and  these  are  of  them.  Ac 
cording  to  such,  the  right  is  never  in  either  extreme,  but 
always  half  way  between  the  extremes.  They  are  con 
tinually  trying  to  reconcile  Yes  and  N~o.  Ifs  and  buts, 
and  excepts,  are  their  delight.  They  have  so  great  a  faith 
in  "the  judicious  mean"  that  they  would  scarcely  believe 


A   FIXED   PRINCIPLE   IN   THE    CASE.  139 

an  oracle,  if  it  uttered  a  full-length  principle.  Were  you 
to  inquire  of  them  whether  the  earth  turns  on  its  axis 
from  East  to  West,  or  from  West  to  East,  you  might  al 
most  expect  the  reply — "  A  little  of  both,"  or  "  Not  ex 
actly  either."  It  is  doubtful  whether  they  would  assent 
to  the  axiom  that  the  whole  is  greater  than  its  part,  with 
out  making  some  qualification.  They  have  a  passion  for 
compromises.  To  meet  their  taste,  Truth  must  always  be 
spiced  with  a  little  Error.  They  cannot  conceive  of  a 
pure,  definite,  entire,  and!  unlimited  law.  And  hence,  in 
discussions  like  the  present,  they  are  constantly  petition 
ing  for  limitations — always  wishing  to  abate,  and  modify, 
and  moderate — ever  protesting  against  doctrines  being 
pursued  to  their  ultimate  consequences. 

But  it  behooves  such  to  recollect,  that  ethical  truth  is 
as  exact  and  as  peremptory  as  physical  truth ;  and  that 
in  this  matter  of  land-tenure,  ^he  verdict  of  morality  must 
be  distinctly  yea  or  nay.  Either  men  have  a  right  to 
make  the  soil  private  property,  or  they  have  not.  There 
is  no  medium.  We  must  choose  one  of  the  two  posi 
tions.  There  can  be  no  half-and-half  opinion.  In  the 
nature  of  things  the  fact  must  be  either  one  way  or  the 
other.  ^7 

If  men  have  not  such  a  right,  we  are  at  once  delivered 
from  the  several  predicaments  already  pointed  out.  If  they 
have  such  a  right,  then  is  that  right  absolute,  sacred,  not 
on  any  pretence  to  be  violated.  *  If  they  have  such  a 
right,  then  is  his  Grace  of  Leeds  justified  in  warning-off 
tourists  from  Ben  Mac  Dhui,  the  Duke  of  Atholl  in  clos 
ing  Glen  Tilt,  the  Duke  of  Buccleugh  in  denying  sites  to 
the  Free  Church,  and  the  Duke  of  Sutherland  in  banishing 
the  Highlanders  to  make  room  for  sheep-walks.  If  they 
have  such  a  right,  then  it  would  be  proper  for  the  sole 
proprietor  of  any  kingdom — a  Jersey  or  Guernsey,  for 
example — to  impose  just  what  regulations  he  might  choose 


140  THE   EIGHT   TO   THE   USE   OF   THE   EAKTH. 

on  its  inhabitants — to  tell  them  that  they  should  not  live 
on  his  property,  unless  they  professed  a  certain  religion, 
spoke  a  particular  language,  paid  him  a  specified  rever 
ence,  adopted  an  authorized  dress,  and  conformed  to  all 
other  conditions  he  might  see  fit  to  make.  If  they  have 
such  a  right,  then  is  there  truth  in  that  tenet  of  the  ultra- 
Tory  school,  that  the  landowners  are  the  only  legitimate 
rulers  of  a  country — that  the  people  at  large  remain  in  it 
only  by  the  landowners'  permission,  and  ought  consequently 
to  submit  to  the  landowners'  rule,  and  respect  whatever 
institutions  the  landowners  set  up.  There  is  no  escape 
from  these  inferences.  They  are  necessary  corollaries 
to  the  theory  that  the  earth  can  become  individual  prop 
erty.  And  they  can  only  be  repudiated  by  denying  that 
theory. 

§  7.  After  all,  nobody  does  implicity  believe  in  land 
lordism.  We  hear  of  estates  being  held  under  the  king, 
that  is,  the  State ;  or  of  their  being  kept  in  trust  for  the 
public  benefit ;  and  not  that  they  are  the  inalienable  pos 
sessions  of  their  nominal  owners.  Moreover,  we  daily 
deny  landlordism  by  our  legislation.  Is  a  canal,  a  rail 
way,  or  a  turnpike  road  to  be  made  ?  we  do  not  scruple 
to  seize  just  as  many  acres  as  may  be  requisite ;  allowing 
the  holders  compensation  for  the  capital  invested.  We 
do  not  wait  for  consent.  An  Act  of  Parliament  super 
sedes  the  authority  of  title  deeds,  and  serves  proprietors 
with  notices  to  quit,  whether  they  will  or  not.  Either 
this  is  equitable,  or  it  is  not.  Either  the  public  are  free  to 
resume  as  much  of  the  earth's  surface  as  they  think  fit,  or 
the  titles  of  the  landowners  must  be  considered  absolute, 
and  all  national  works  must  be  postponed  until  lords  and 
squires  please  to  part  with  the  requisite  slices  of  their 
estates.  If  we  decide  that  the  claims  of  individual  owner 
ship  must  give  way,  then  we  imply  that  the  right  of  the 


THE   EIGHT   OF    SOCIETY    SUPREME.  141 

nation  at  large  to  the  soil  is  supreme — that  the  right  of 
private  possession  only  exists  by  general  consent — that 
general  consent  being  withdrawn  it  ceases — or,  in  other 
words,  that  it  is  no  right  at  all. 

§8.  "  But  to  what  does  this  doctrine,  that  men  are 
equally  entitled  to  the  use  of  the  earth,  lead  ?  Must  we 
return  to  the  times  of  uninclosed  wilds,  and  subsist  on 
roots,  berries,  and  game  ?  Or  are  we  to  be  left  to  the 
management  of  Messrs.  Fourrier,  Owen,  Louis  Blanc, 
and  Co.  ?  " 

Neither.  Such  a  doctrine  is  consistent  with  the  high 
est  state  of  civilization ;  may  be^carried  out  without  in 
volving  a  community  of  goods;  and  need^cause  no  very 
serious  revolution  in  existing  arrangements.  ''The  change 
required  would  simply  be  a  change  of  landlords.  Sepa 
rate  ownerships  would  merge  into  the  joint-stock  owner 
ship  of  the  public.  Instead  of  being  in  the  possession  of 
individuals,  the  country  would  be  held  by  the  great  cor 
porate  body — Society,^  Instead  of  leasing  his  acres  from 
an  isolated  proprietor,  the  farmer  would  lease  them  from 
the  nation,  /[nstead  of  paying  his  rent  to  the  agent  of 
Sir  John  or  his  Grace,  he  would  pay  it  to  an  agent  or 
deputy-agent  of  the  community.  Stewards  would  be  pub 
lic  officials  instead  of  private  ones ;  and  tenancy  the  only 
land  tenure. 

A  state  of  things  so  ordered  would  be  in  perfect  har 
mony  with  the  moral  law.  Under  iV  all  men  would  be 
equally  landlords ;  all  men  would  be  alike  free  to  become 
tenants'.  A,  B,  C,  and  the  rest,  might  compete  for  a  va 
cant  farm  as  now,  and  one  of  them  might  take  that  farm, 
without  in  any  way  violating  the  principles  of  pure  equity. 
All  would  be  equally  free  to  bid ;  all  would  be  equally 
free  to  refrain.  And  when  the  farm  had  been  let  to  A,  B, 
or  C,  all  parties  would  have  done  that  which  they  willed — 


THE   EIGHT   TO   THE   USE   OF   THE   EAKTH. 

the  one  in  choosing  to  pay  a  given  sum  to  his  fellow- 
men  for  the  use  of  certain  lands — the  others  in  refusing  to 

O 

pay  that  sum.  Clearly,  therefore,  on  such  a  system,  the 
earth  might  be  inclosed,  occupied,  and  cultivated,  in  entire 
subordination  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

§  9.  No  doubt  great  difficulties  must  attend  the 
resumption,  by  mankind  at  large,  of  their  rights  to  the 
soil.  The  question  of  compensation  to  existing  proprie 
tors  is  a  complicated  one — one  that  perhaps  cannot  be 
settled  in  a  strictly-equitable  manner.  Had  we  to  deal 
with  the  parties  who  originally  robbed  the  human  race 
of  its  heritage,  we  might  make  short  work  of  the  mat 
ter.  But,  unfortunately,  most  of  our  present  landown 
ers  are  men  who  have,  either  mediately  or  immediately 
— either  by  their  own  acts,  or  by  the  acts  of  their 
ancestors — given  for  their  estates,  equivalents  of  honestly- 
earned  wealth,  believing  that  they  were  investing  their 
savings  in  a  legitimate  manner.  To  justly  estimate  and 
liquidate  the  claims  of  such,  is  one  of  the  most  intricate 
problems  society  will  one  day  have  to  solve.  But  with 
this  perplexity  and  our  extrication  from  it,  abstract  mor 
ality  has  no  concern.  Men  having  got  themselves  into 
the  dilemma  by  disobedience  to  the  law,  must  get  out  of 
it  as  well  as  they  can;  and  with  as  little  injury  to  the 
landed  class  as  may  be. 

Meanwhile,  we  shall  do  well  to  recollect,  that  tljere 
are  others  besides  the  landed  class  to  be  considered.  ,,  In 
our  tender  regard  for  the  vested  interests  of  the  few,  let 
us  not  forget  that  the  rights  of  the  many  are  in  abeyance ; 
and  must  remain  so,  as  long  as  the  earth  is  monopolized 
by  individuals.  Let  us  remember,  too,  that  the  injustice 
thus  inflicted  on  the  mass  of  mankind,  is  an  injustice  of 
the  gravest  nature.  The  fact  that  it  is  not  so  regarded, 
proves  nothing.  In  early  phases  of  civilization  even  homi- 


INTERESTS   OF   THE   MANY   TO   BE   REGARDED.          143 


cide  is  thought  lightly  of.  The  suttees  of  India,  together 
with  the  practice  elsewhere  followed  of  sacrificing  a  heca 
tomb  of  human  victims  at  the  burial  of  a  chief,  shows 
this :  and  probably  cannibals  consider  the  slaughter  of 
those  whom  "  the  fortune  .of  war  "  has  made  their  prison 
ers,  perfectly  justifiable.^  -  It  was  once  also  universally  ' 
supposed  that  slavery  was  a  natural  and  quite  legitimate 
institution — a  condition  into  which  some  were  born,  and 
to  which  they  ought  to  submit  as  to  a  Divine  ordination ; 
nay,  indeed,  a  great  proportion  of  mankind  hold  this  opin 
ion  still.  A  higher  social  development,  however ^has  gen 
erated  in  us  a  better  faith,  and  we  now  to  a  considerable 
extent  recognize  the  claims  of  humanityr/  But  our  civili 
zation  is  only  partial.  It  may  by-and-by  be  perceived, 
that  Equity  utters  dictates  to  which  we  have  not  yet  lis 
tened  ;  and  men  may  then  learn,  that  to  deprive  others  of 
their  rights  to  the  use  of  the  earth,  is  to  commit  a  crime 
inferior  only  in  wickedness  to  the  crime  of  taking  away 
their  lives  or  personal  liberties. 

§  10.  Briefly  reviewing  the  argument,  we  see  that 
the  right  of  each  man  to  the  use  of  the  earth,  limited  only 
by 'the  like  rights  of  his  fellow-men,  is  immediately  de- 
ducible  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom.  We  see  that  the 
maintenance  of  this  right  necessarily  forbids  private  prop 
erty  in  land.  On  examination  all  existing  titles  to  such 
property  turn  out  to  be  invalid ;  those  founded  on  recla 
mation  inclusive.  It  appears  that  not  even  an  equal  appor 
tionment  of  the  earth  amongst  its  inhabitants  could  gener 
ate  a  legitiniate  proprietorship.  "We  find  that  if  pushed  to 
its  ultimate  consequences,  a  claim  to  exclusive  possession 
of  the  soil  involves  a  landowning  despotism.  We  further 
find  that  such  a  claim  is  constantly  denied  by  the  enact 
ments  of  our  legislature.  And  we  find  lastly,  that  the 
theory  of  the  co-heirship  of  all  men  to  the  soil,  is  con- 


THE  EIGHT  OF   PROPERTY. 


I  sistent  with  the  highest  civilization  ;  and  that,  however 
difficult  it  may  be  to  embody  that  theory  in  fact,  Equity 
*  sternly  commands  it  to  be  done. 


CHAPTEK    X. 

THE    EIGHT   OF   PEOPEETY. 

§  1.  The  moral  law,  being  the  law  of  the  social 
state,  is  obliged  wholly  to  ignore  the  ante-social  state. 
Constituting,  as  the  principles  of  pure  morality  do,  a  code 
of  conduct  for  the  perfect  man,  they  cannot  be  made  to 
adapt  themselves  to  the  actions  of  the  uncivilized  man, 
even  under  the  most  ingenious  hypothetical  conditions — 
cannot  be  made  even  to  recognize  those  actions  so  as  to 
pass  any  definite  sentence  upon  them.  Overlooking  this 
fact,  thinkers,  in  their  attempts  to  prove  some  of  the  first 
theorems  of  ethics,  have  commonly  fallen  into  the  error 
of  referring  back  to  an  imaginary  state  of  savage  wild- 
ness,  instead  of  referring  forward  to  an  ideal  civilization, 
as  they  should  have  done ;  and  have,  in  consequence,  en 
tangled  themselves  in  difficulties  arising  out  of  the  dis 
cordance  between  ethical  principles  and  the  assumed 
premises.  To  this  circumstance  is  attributable  that 
vagueness  by  which  the  arguments  used  to  establish  the 
right  of  property  in  a  logical  manner,  are  characterized. 
Whilst  possessed  of  a  certain  plausibility,  they  yet  cannot 
be  considered  conclusive  ;  inasmuch  as  they  suggest  ques 
tions  and  objections  that  admit  of  no  satisfactory  answers. 
Let  us  take  a  sample  of  these  arguments,  and  examine  its 
defects. 

"  Though  the   earth   and  all  inferior  creatures,"  says 


VIEWS    OF   LOCKE.  145 

Locke,  "  be  common  to  all  men,  yet  every  man  has  a  prop 
erty  in  his  own  person :  this  nobody  has  a  right  to  but 
himself.  ,  The  labour  of  his  body,  and  the  work  of  his 
hands,  we  may  say  are  properly  his.>  Whatever  then  he 
removes  out  of  the  state  that  nature  hath  provided  and 
left  it  in,  he  hath  mixed  his  labour  with,  and  joined  to  it 
something  that  is  his  own,  and  thereby  makes  it  his  prop 
erty.  Lit  being  by  him  removed  from  the  common  state 
nature  hath  placed  it  in,  it  hath  by  this  labour  something 
annexed  to  it  that  excludes  the  common  right  of  other  men. 
For  this  labour  being  the  unquestionable  property  of  the 
labourer,  no  man  but  he  can  have  a  right  to  what  that  is 
once  joined  to,  at  least  when  there  is  enough  and  as  good 
left' in  common  for  others."  /" 

If  inclined  to  cavil,  one  might  in  reply  to  this  observe, 
that  as,  according  to  the  premises,  "  the  earth  and  all  in 
ferior  creatures  " — all  things,  in  fact,  that  the  earth  pro 
duces — are  "  common  to  all  men,"  the  consent  of  all  men 
must  be  obtained  before  any  article  can  be  equitably 
"  removed  from  the  common  state  nature  hath  placed  it 
in."  It  might  be  argued  that  the  real  question  is  over 
looked,  when  it  is  said,  that,  by  gathering  any  natural 
product,  a  man  "  hath  mixed  his  labour  with  it,  and  joined 
to  it  something  that  is  his  own,  and  thereby  made  it  his 
property ; "  for  that  the  point  to  be  debated  is,  whether  he 
had  any  right  to  gather,  or  mix  his  labour  with  that, 
which,  by  the  hypothesis,  previously  belonged  to  mankind 
at  large.  The  reasoning  used  in  the  last  chapter  to  prove 
that  no  amount  of  labour,  bestowed  by  an  individual 
upon  a  part  of  the  earth's  surface.,  can  nullify  the  title  of 
society  to  that  part,  might  be  similarly  employed  to  show 
that  no  one  can,  ByTEe"mere  act  of  appropriating  to  him- 
si'lf  any  \vild  unclaimed  animal  or  fruit,  supersede  the  joint 
claims  of  other  men  to  it/  It  may  be  quite  true  that  the 
labour  a  man  expends  in  catching  or  gathering,  gives  him 
7 


146  THE   EIGHT   OF   PROPERTY. 

a  better  right  to  the  thing  caught  or  gathered,  than  any 
one  other  man ;  but  the  question  at  issue  is,  whether  "by 
labour  so  expended,  he  has  ^i^f  hi?  v^ff^f  ^  the  thing 
caught  or  gathered,  greater  Jhajijjia^ii'eexisting  rights  of 
all  other  men  put  together.  And  unless  he  can  prove 
that  he  has  done  this,  his  title  to  possession  cannot  be 
admitted  as  a  matter  of  right,  but  can  be  conceded  only  on 
tlje  ground  of  convenience.  ^ 

Further  difficulties  are  suggested  by  the  qualification, 
that  the  claim  to  any  article  of  property  thus  obtained,  is 
valid  only  "  when  there  is  enough  and  as  good  left  in 
common  for  others."  A  condition  like  this  gives  birth  to 
such  a  host  of  queries,  doubts,  and  limitations,  as  practi 
cally  to  neutralize  the  general  proposition  entirely.  It 
may  be  asked,  for  example — How  is  it  to  be  known  that 
enough  is  "  left  in  common  for  others  "  ?  Who  can  deter 
mine  whether  what  remains  is  "  as  good "  as  what  is 
taken  ?  How  if  the  remnant  is  less  accessible  ?  If  there 
is  not  enough  "  left  in  common  for  others,"  how  must  the 
right  of  appropriation  be  exercised  ?  "Why,  in  such  case, 
does  the  mixing  of  labour  with  the  acquired  object,  cease 
to  "  exclude  the  common  right  of  other  men  '^  Suppos 
ing  enough  to  be  attainable,  but  not  all  equally  good,  by 
what  rule  must  each  man  choose  ?  Out  of  which  inquisi 
tion  it  seems  impossible  to  liberate  the  alleged  right,  with 
out  such  mutilations  as  to  render  it,  in  an  ethical  point  of 
view,  entirely  valueless. 

Thus,  as  already  hinted,  we  find,  that  the  circumstances 
of  savage  life,  render  the  principles  of  abstract  morality 
inapplicable ;  for  it  is  impossible,  under  ante-social  condi 
tions,  to  determine  the  lightness  or  wrongness  of  certain 
actions  by  an  exact  measurement  of  the  amount  of  freedom 
assumed  by  the  parties  concerned.  We  must  not  expect, 
therefore,  that  the  r^ght  of  property  can  be  satisfactorily 
based  upon  the  premis'es^afForded  by  such  a  state  of 
existence. 


ITS   LEGITIMATE   FOUNDATION. 

§  2.  But,  under  the  system  of  land  tenure  pointed 
out  in  the  last  chapter,  as  the  only  one  that  is  consistent 
with  the  equal  claims  of  all  men  to  the  use  of  the  earth, 
these  difficulties  disappear;  and  the  right  of  property 
obtains  a  legitimate  foundation.  We  have  seen  that, 
without  any  infraction  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  an 
individual  may  lease  fromjsflflip.t.y  .a. 


by  agreeing  to  pay  in  return  a  stated  amount  of  the  j>ro~ 
duce  he  obtains  from  that  soil.  We  found  that,  in  doing 
this,  he  does  no  more  than  what  every  other  man  is  equally 
free  with  himself  to  do  —  that  each  has  the  same  power 
with  himself  to  become  the  tenant  —  and  that  the  rent  he 
pays  accrues  alike  to  all.  Having  thus  hired  a  tract  of 
land  from  his  fellow-men,  for  a  given  period,  for  under 
stood  purposes,  and  on  specified  terms  —  having  thus  ob 
tained,  for  a  time,  the  exclusive  use  of  that  land  by  a 
definite  agreement  with  its  owners,  it  is  manifest  that  an 
individual  may,  without  any  infringement  of  the  rights  of 
others,  appropriate  to  himself  that  portion  of  produce 
which  remains  after  he  has  paid  to  mankind  the  promised 
rent.  He  has  now,  to  use  Locke's  expression,  ."  mixed  his 
labour  with  "  certain  products  of  the  earth  ;  and  his  claim 
to  them  is^  in  this  case  valid,  because  he  obtained  the  con- 
sent  of  ^society  before  so  expending  his  labour  ;  .and  having 
fulfilled  the  condition  which  society  imposed  in  giving 
that  consent  —  the  payment  of  rent  —  society,  :to  fulfil  its 
part  of  the  agreement,  must  acknowledge  his  title  to  that 
surplus  which  remains  after  the  rent  has  been  paid. 
l£Provided  you  deliver  to  us  a  stated  share  of  the  produce 
whicli  by  cultivation  you  can  obtain  from  this  piece  of 
land,  we  give  you  the  exclusive  use  of  the  remainder  of 
that  produce  :  "  these  are  the  words  of  the  contract  ;  and 
in  virtue  of  this  contract,  the  tenant  may  equitably  claim 
the  supplementary  share  as  his  private  property  :  may 
so  claim  it  without  any  disobedience  to  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  ;  and  has  therefore  a  right  so  to  claim  it. 


148  THE   EIGHT  OF  PROPEETY. 

Any  doubt  that  may  be  felt  as  to  the  fact  that  this  is 
a  logical  deduction  from  onr  first  principle,  that  every 
man  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills  provided  he  in 
fringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man,  may  be 
readily  cleared  up  by  comparing  the  respective  degrees 
of  freedom  assumed  in  such  a  case  by  the  occupier  and 
the  members  of  society  with  whom  he  bargains.  As  was 
shown  in  the  preceding  chapter,  if  the  public  altogether 
deprive  any  individual  of  the  use  of  the  earth,  they  allow 
him  less  liberty  than  they  themselves  claim ;  and  by  so 
breaking  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  commit  a  wrong.  If, 
conversely,  an  individual  usurps  a  given  portion  of  the 
earth,  to  which,  as  we  have  seen,  all  other  men  have  as 
good  a  title  as  himself,  he  breaks  the  law  by  assuming 
more  liberty"tnan  tlie  rest.  But  \^hen  an  individual  holds 
land  as  a  tenant  nf  j=u^mpty;  a  balance  is  maintained  be 
tween  these  extremes^  andthe  claimspf  both  parties  are 
respected.  ~K  price  is  paid  by  tEe  one,  for  a  certain  privi 
lege  granted  by  the  other.  By  the  fact  of  the  agreement 
being  made,  it  is  shown  that  such  price  and  privilege  are 
considered  to  be  equivalents.  The  lessor  and  the  lessee 
have  both,  within  the  prescribed  limits,  done  that  winch 
they  ivitted:  the  one  in  letting  a  certain  holding  for  a  spe 
cified  sum ;  the  other  in  agreeing  to  give  that  sum.  And 
so  long  as  this  contract  remains  intact,  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  is  duly  observed.  If,  however,  any  of  the  pre 
scribed  conditions  be  not  fulfilled,  the  law  is  necessarily 
broken,  and  the  parties  are  involved  in  one  of  the  predic 
aments  above  named.  If  the  tenant  refuses  to  pay  the 
rent,  then  he  tacitly  lays  claim  to  the  exclusive  use  and 
benefit  of  the  land  he  occupies — practically  asserts  that 
he  is  the  sole  owner  of  its  produce ;  and  consequently  vio 
lates  the  law,  by  assuming  a  greater  share  of  freedom 
than  the  rest  of  mankind.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  society 
take  from  the  tenant  that  portion  of  the  fruits  obtained 


f  < 

SOCIALISM   AND   COMMUOTSM.  149 

by  the  culture  of  his  farm,  which  remains  with  him  after 
the  payment  of  rent,  they  virtually  deny  him  the  use  of 
the  earth  entirely  (for  by  the  use  of  the  earth  we  mean 
the  use  of  its  products),  and  in  so  doing,  claim  for  them 
selves  a  greater  share  of  liberty  than  they  allow  him. 
Clearly,  therefore,  this  surplus  produce  equitably  remains 
with  the  tenant :  society  cannot  take  it  without  trespass 
ing  upon  his  freedom ;  he  can  take  it  without  trespassing 
on  the  freedom  of  society.  And  as,  according  to  the  law, 
he  is  free  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not 
the  equal  freedom  of  any  other,  he  is  free  to  take  possess 
ion  of  such  surplus  as  his  property. 

§  3.  ^The  doctrine  that  all  men  have  equal  rights  to 
the  use  of  the  earth,  does  indeed,  at  first  sight,  seem  to  coun 
tenance  a  species  of  social  organization,  at  variance  with 
that  from  which  the  right  of  property  has  just  been  de 
duced  ;  an  organization,  namely,  in  which  the  public,  in 
stead  of  letting  out  the  land  to  individual  members  of 
their  body,  shall  retain  it  in  their  own  hands ;  cultivate  it 
by  joint-stock  agency ;  and  share  the  produce :  in  fact, 
what  is  usually  termed  Socialism  pr  GammunismJ > 

Plausible  though  it  may  be,  such  a  scheme  is  not  capa 
ble  of  realization  in  strict  conformity  with  the  moral  law. 
Of  the  two  forms  under  which  it  may  be  presented,  the 
one  is  ethically  imperfect ;  and  the  other,  although  correct 
iii  theory,  is  impracticable. 

Thus,  if  an  equal  portion  of  the  earth's  produce  is 
awarded  to  every  man,  irrespective  of  the  amount  or  qual 
ity  of  the  labour  he  has  contributed  toward  the  crbtain- 
ment  of  that  produce^aJbiejiclL  of  equity  is  committed. 
-  Our  first  principle  requires,  not  that  all  shall  have  like 
shares  of  the  things  which  minister  to  the  gratification  of 
the  faculties,  but  that  all  shall  have  like  freedom  to  pur 
sue  those  things — shall  have  like  scope.  It  is  one  thing 


150  THE    EIGHT   OF   PEOPEETY. 

to  give  to  each  an  opportunity  of  acquiring  the  objects  he 
desires ;  it  is  another,  and  quite  a  different  thing,  to  give 
the  objects  themselves,  no  matter  whether  due  endeavour 
has  or  has  not  been  made  to  obtain  them.  TKe  one  we 
have  seen  to  be  the  primary  laAv  of  the  Divine  scheme ; 
the  other,  by  interfering  with  the  ordained  connection  be 
tween  desire  and  gratification,  shows  its  disagreement 
with  that  scheme/  N"ay  more,  it  necessitates  an  absolute 
violation  of  the  principle  of  equal  freedom.  For  when 
we  assert  the  entire  liberty  of  each,  bounded  only  by  the 
like  liberty  of  all,  we  assert  that  each  is  free  to  do  what 
ever  his  desires  dictate,  within  the  prescribed  limits — that 
each  is  free,  therefore,  to  claim  for  himself  all  those  grati 
fications,  and  sources  of  gratification,  attainable  by  him 
within  those  limits — all  those  gratifications,  and  sources 
of  gratification,  which  he  can  procure  without  trespassing 
upon  the  spheres  of  action  of  his  neighbours.  If,  there 
fore,  out  of  many  starting  with  like  fields  of  activity,  one 
obtains,  by  his  greater  strength,  greater  ingenuity,  or 
greater  application,  more  gratifications  and  sources  of 
gratification  than  the  rest,  and  does  this  without  in  any 
way  trenching  upon  the  equal  freedom  of  the  rest,  the 
moral  law  assigns  him  an  exclusive  right  to  all  those  extra 
gratifications  and  sources  of  gratification ;  nor  can  the  rest 
take  from  him  without  claiming  for  themselves  greater 
liberty  of  action  than  he  claims,  and  thereby  violating 
that  law.  Whence  it  follows,  that  an  equal  apportion 
ment  of  the  fruits  of  the  earth  amongst  all,  is  not  consist 
ent  with  pure  justice. 

Ir»  on  the  other  hand,  each  is  to  have  allotted  to  him  a 
share  of  produce  proportionate  to  the  degree  in  which  he 
has  aided  production,  the  proposal,  whilst  it  is  abstract 
edly  just,  is  no  longer  practicable.  -  Were  all  men  culti 
vators  of  the  soil,  it  would  perhaps  be  possible  to  form  an 
approximate  estimate  of  their  several  claims.  But  to  as- 


FALLACY  OF  THE  COMMUNIST  THEORY.      151 

certain  the  respective  amounts  of  help  given  by  different 
kinds  of  mental  and  bodily  labourers,  toward  procuring 
the  general  stock  of  the  necessaries  of  life,  is  an  utter  im 
possibility.  We  have  no  means  of  making  such  a  division 
save  that  afforded  by  the  law  of  supply  and  demand,  and 
this  means  the  hypothesis  excludes/^" 

§  4.  An  argument  fatal  to  the  communist  theory,  is  /  C^. 
suggested  by  the  fact,  thfcta  desire  for  property  is  one  of  v 
the  elements  of  our  nature.  Repeated  allusion  has  been 
made  to  the  admitted  truth,  that  acquisitiveness  is  an  un 
reasoning  impulse  quite  distinct  from  the  desires  whose 
gratifications  property  secures — an  impulse  that  is  often 
obeyed  at  the  expense  of  those  desires.  And  if  a  propen 
sity  to  personal  acquisition  be  really  a  component  of  man's 
constitution,  then  that  cannot  be  a  right  form  of  society 
which  affords  it  no  scope.  Socialists  do  indeed  allege  that 
private  appropriation  is  an  abuse  of  this  propensity,  whose 
normal  function,  they  say,  is  to  impel  us  to  accumulate 
for  the  benefit  of  the  public  at  large./  But  in  thus  at 
tempting  to  escape  from  one  difficulty,  they  do  but  entan 
gle  themselves  in  another.  Such  an  explanation  overlooks 
the  fact  that  the  use  and  abuse  of  a  faculty  (whatever  the 
etymology  of  the  words  may  imply)  differ  only  in  degree  ; 
whereas  their  assumption  is,  that  they  differ  in  kind. 
^JU.luttony  is  an  abuse  of  the  desire  for  food ;  timidity,  an 
abuse  of  the  feeling  which  in  moderation  produces  pru 
dence;  servility,  an  abuse  of  the  sentiment  that  generates 
respect ;  obstinacy,  of  that  from  which  firmness  springs : 
in  all  of  which  cases  we  find  that  the  legitimate  manifesta 
tions  differ  from  the  illegitimate  ones,  merely  in  quantity, 
and  not  in  quality.  So  also  with  the  instinct  of  accumu- 

*  These  inferences  do  not  at  all  militate  against  joint-stock  systems  of 
production  and  living,  which  are  in  all  probability  \vhat  Socialism  prophe 
sies. 


152  THE   EIGHT    OF   PEOPEETY. 

tion.  It  may  be  quite  true  that  its  dictates  have  been, 
and  still  are,  followed  to  an  absurd  excess ;  but  it  is  also 
true  that  no  change  in  the  state  of  society  will  alter  its 
nature  and  its  office."  >To  whatever  extent  moderated,  it 
must  still  be  a  desire  for  personal  acquisition.  Whence  itr 
follows  that  a  system  affording  opportunity  for  its  exer 
cise  must  ever  be  retained;  which  means,  that  the,  system 
of  private  property  must  be  retained ;  and  this  ^presup 
poses  a  right  of  private  property,  for  by  right  we  mean 
that  which  harmonizes  with  the  human  constitution  as  di 
vinely  ordained. 

§  5.  There  is,  however,  a  still  more  awkward  di 
lemma  into  which  M.  Proudhoii  and  his  party  betray 
themselves.  For  if,  as  they  assert,  "  all  property  is  rob 
bery" — if  no  one  can  equitably  become  the  exclusive 
possessor  of  any  article — or  as  we  say,  obtain  a  right  to 
it,  then,  amongst  other  consequences,  it  follows,  that  a 
man  can  have  no  right  to  the  things  he  consumes  for  food. 
And  if  these  are  not  his  before  eating  them,  how  can  they 
become  his  at  all  ?  As  Locke  asks,  "  when  do  they  begin 
to  be  his  ?  when  he  digests  ?  or  when  he  eats  ?  or  when 
he  boils  ?  or  when  he  brings  them  home  ? "  If  no  pre 
vious  acts  can  make  them  his  property,  neither  can  any 
process  of  assimilation  do  it ;  not  even  their  absorption 
into  the  tissues.  Wherefore,  pursuing  the  idea,  we  arrive 
at  the  curious  conclusion,  that  as  the  whole  of  his  bones, 
muscles,  skin,  &c.,  have  been  thus  built  up  from  nutri 
ment  not  belonging  to  him,  a  man  has  no  property  in  his 
own  flesh  and  blood — can  have  no  valid  title  to  himself— 
has  no  more  claim  to  his  own  limbs  than  he  has  to  the 
limbs  of  another — and  has  as  good  a  right  to  his  neigh 
bour's  body  as  to  his  own  !  Did  we  exist  after  the  same 
fashion  as  those  compound  polyps,  in  which  a  number  of 
individuals  are  based  upon  a  living  trunk  common  to  them 


FLOWS  FROM  THE  LAW  OF  EQUAL  FEEEDOM.     153 

all,  such  a  theory  would  be  rational  enough.  But  until 
Communism  can  be  carried  to  that  extent,  it  will  be  best 
to  stand  by  the  old  doctrine. 

§  6.  Further  argument  appears  to  be  unnecessary. 
We  have  seen  that  the  right  of  property  is  deducible  from 
the  law  of  equal  freedom — that~itTs~presupposed  by  the 
human  constitution — and  that  its  denial  involves  absurdi 
ties. 

/Were  it  not  that  we  shall  frequently  have  to  refer  to 
the  fact  hereafter,  it  would  be  scarcely  needful  to  show 
that  the  taking  away  another's  property  is  an  infringe 
ment  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  and  is  therefore  wrong."'' 
If  A  appropriates  to  himself  something  belonging  to  B, 
one  of  two  things  must  take  place :  either  B  does  the  like 
to  A,  or  he  does  not.  If  A  has  no  property,  or  if  his 
property  is  inaccessible  to  B,  B  has  evidently  no  opportu 
nity  of  exercising  equal  freedom  with  A,  by  claiming  from 
him  something  of  like  value ;  and  A  has  therefore  assumed 
a  greater  share  of  freedom  than  he  allows  B,  and  has 
broken  the  law.  If  again,  A's  property  is  open  to  B,  anxi 
A  permits  B  to  use  like  freedom  with  himself  by  taking 
an  equivalent,  there  is  no  violation  of  the  law ;  and  the 
affair  practically  becomes  one  of  barter.  But  such  a 
transaction  will  never  take  place  save  in  theory ;  for  A  has 
no  motive  to  appropriate  B's  property  with  the  intention 
of  letting  B  take  an  equivalent :  seeing  that  if  he  really 
means  to  let  B  have  what  B  thinks  an  equivalent,  he  will 
prefer  to  make  the  exchange  by  consent  in  the  ordinary 
way/*'  The  only  case  simulating  this,  is  one  in  which  A 
takes  from  B  a  thing  that  B  does  not  wish  to-  part  with; 
that  is,  a  thing  for  which  A  can  give  B  nothing  that  B 
thinks  an  equivalent ;  and  as  the  amount  of  gratification 
which  B  has  in  the  possession  of  this  thing,  is  the  measure 
of  its  value  to  him,  it  follows  that  if  A  cannot  give  B  a 


15-i  THE   EIGHT   OF   PROPERTY   IN   IDEAS. 

thing  which  affords  B  equal  gratification,  or  in  other 
words  what  he  thinks  an  equivalent,  then  A  has  taken 
from  B  what  affords  A  satisfaction,  but  does  not  return  to 
B  what  affords  B  satisfaction ;  and  has  therefore  broken  the 
law  by  assuming  the  greater  share  of  freedom.  Where 
fore  we  find  it  to  be  a  logical  deduction  from  the  law  of 
equal  freedom,  that  no  man  can  rightfully  take  property 
from  another  against  his  will. 


OHAPTEE    XI. 

THE  EIGHT  OF  PEOPEETY  IN  IDEAS. 

§  1.  It  is  tolerably  self-evident  that/no  violation  of 
the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  committed  in  the  acquisition 
of  knowledge — that  knowledge,  at  least,  which  is  open  to 
all.  ~  A  man  may  read,  hear,  and  observe,  to  as  great  an 
extent  as  he  pleases,  without  in  the  least  diminishing  the 
liberty  of  others  to  do  the  like — in  fact,  without  affecting 
the  condition  of  others  in  any  way.  It  is  clear,  too,  that 
the  knowledge  thus  obtained  may  be  digested,  reorgan 
ized,  or  combined  afresh,  and  new  knowledge  educed  from 
it  by  its  possessor,  without  the  rights  of  his  fellows  being 
thereby  trespassed  upon.  And  it  is  further  manifest,  that 
the  moral  law  permits  a  man  who  has  by  his  intellectual 
labour  obtained  such  new  knowledge,  to  keep  it  for  his 
own  exclusive  use,  or  claim  it  as  his  private  property. 
He  who  does  this,  in  no  degree  exceeds  the  prescribed, 
limits  of  individual  freedom.  He  abridges  no  one's  lib 
erty  of  action.  Every  other  person  retains  as  much  scope 
for  thought  and  deed  as  before.  And  each  is  free  to  ac 
quire  the  same  facts — to  elaborate  from  them,  if  he  can, 
the  same  new  ideas — and  in  a  similar  manner  employ  those 


ITS   UNQUESTIONABLE   VALIDITY.  155 

new  ideas  for  his  private  advantage.  Seeing,  therefore, 
that  a  man  may  claim  the  exclusive  use  of  his  original 
ideas  without  Overstepping  the  boundaries  of  equal  free 
dom, .ft  follows  that  he  has  a  right  SGI  to  claim  them ;  or,  in 
other  words,  such  ideas  are  his  property/ 

Of  course  the  argument  used  in  the  last  chapter  to 
show  that  material  property  cannot  be  taken  from  its  pos 
sessor  without  a  breach  of  the  law,  is  applicable  to  prop 
erty  of  this  kind  also. 

§  2.  That  a  man's  right  to  the  produce  of  his  brain 
is  equally  valid  with  his  right  to  the  produce  of  his  hands, 
is  a  fact  which  has  yet  obtained  but  a  very  imperfect  rec 
ognition.  It  is  true  that  we  have  patent  laws,  a  law  of 
copyright,  and  acts  for  the  registration  of  designs ;  but 
these,  or  at  any  rate  two  of  them,  have  been  enacted  not 
so'  much  in  obedience  to  the  dictates  of  justice,  as  in  def 
erence  to  the  suggestions  of  trade  policy.  "  A  patent  is 
not  a  thing  which  can  be  claimed  as  a  right,"  we  are  told 
by  legal  authorities,  but  is  intended  to  "  act  as  a  stimulus 
to  industry  and  talent."  It  is  not  because  the  piracy  of 
patterns  would  be  wrong  that  legislators  forbid  it,  but  be 
cause  they  wish  to  afford  "  encouragement  to  manufac 
tures."  Similar  also  are  the  current  opinions.  Measures 
of  this  nature  are  commonly  considered  by  the  public  as 
giving  to  inventors  a  certain  "  privilege,"  a  "  reward,"  a 
sort  of  modified  "  monopoly."  It  is  on  the  ground  of 
commercial  statesmanship  that  they  are  approved;  and 
not  as  being  necessary  for  the  administration  of  justice. 

The  prevalence  of  such  a  belief  is  by  no  means  credit 
able  to  the  national  conscience,  and  indicates  a  sad  blunt- 
ness  of  moral  feeling.  To  think  that  the  profits  which  a 
speculator  makes  by  a  rise  in  the  share-market,  should  be 
recognized  as  legally  and  equitably  his  property,  and  yet 
that  some  new  combination  of  ideas,  which  it  may  have 


156  THE   EIGHT   OF   PROPERTY   IN   IDEAS. 

cost  an  ingenious  man  years  of  application  to  complete, 
cannot  be  "  claimed  as  a  right "  by  that  man !  To  think 
that  a  sinecurist  should  be  held  to  have  a  "  vested  inter 
est  "  in  his  office,  and  a  just  title  to  compensation  if  it  is 
abolished,  and  yet  that  an  invention  over  which  no  end 
of  mental  toil  has  been  spent,  and  on  which  the  poor  me 
chanic  has  laid  out  perhaps  his  last  sixpence — an  inven 
tion  which  he  has  completed  entirely  by  his  own  labour 
and  with  his  own  materials — has  wrought,  as  it  were,  out 
of  the  very  substance  of  his  own  mind — should  not  be 
acknowledged  as  his  property  !  To  think  that  his  title  to 
it  should  be  admitted  merely  as  a  matter  of  convenience — 
admitted  even  then  only  on  payment  of  some  £400 — and, 
after  all,  quashed  on  the  most  trifling  pretences  !  What 
a  thick-skinned  perception  of  justice  does  this  show ! 
What  a  want  of  ability  to  appreciate  matters  at  all  re 
moved  beyond  the  sphere  of  the  external  senses  !  One 
would  think  that  equity  afforded  np  guidance  beyond 
transactions  in  material  things — weights,  measures,  and 
money.  Let  a  shop-boy  take  from  his  master's  till  a  visi 
ble,  tangible,  ponderable  sovereign,  and  all  can  see  that 
the  rights  of  ownership  have  been  violated.  Yet  those 
who  exclaim  with  such  indignant  virtue  against  theft,  will 
purchase  a  pirated  edition  of  a  book,  without  any  qualms 
of  conscience  concerning  the  receipt  of  stolen  goods. 
Dishonesty,  when  shown  in  house-breaking  or  sheep-steal 
ing,  is  held  up  to  eternal  infamy,  and  those  convicted  of 
it  are  forever  excluded  from  society ;  but  the  manufacturer 
who  steals  his  foreman's  improved  plan  for  the  spinning 
of  cotton,  or  the  building  of  steam-engines,  continues  to 
be  held  in  high  respect.  The  law  is  active  enough  in  ap 
prehending  the  urchin  who  may  have  deprived  some  com 
fortable  citizen  of  his  pocket-handkerchief,  and  will  deal 
with  the  young  scapegrace  at  the  public  expense;  but 
there  is  no  redress  for  the  poverty-stricken  schemer  who 


THE   CLAIMS    OF   INVENTION.  157 

is  robbed  by  some  wealthy  scamp  of  that  which  formed 
the  sole  hope  of  his  life.  Strong  illustrations  these  of  the 
fact,  that  the  moral  sense,  when  unguided  by  systematic 
deduction,  fails  to  find  its  way  through  the  labyrinth  of 
confused  opinion,  to  a  correct  code  of  duty. 

§  3.  As  already  remarked,  it  is  a  common  notion, 
and  one  more  especially  pervading  the  operative  classes, 
that  the  exclusive  use  by  its  discoverer  of  any  new  or  im 
proved  mode  of  production,  is  a  species  of  monopoly,  in 
the  sense  in  which  that  word  is  conventionally  used.  To 
let  a  man  have  the  entire  benefit  accruing  from  the  em 
ployment  of  some  more  efficient  machine,  or  better  pro 
cess  invented  by  him ;  and  to  allow  no  other  person  to 
adopt  and  apply  for  his  own  advantage  the  same  plan, 
they  hold  to  be  an  injustice.  Nor  are  there  wanting  phi 
lanthropic  and  even  thinking  men,  who  consider  that  the 
valuable  ideas  originated  by  individuals — ideas  which 
may  be  of  great  national  advantage — should  be  taken 
out  of  private  hands  and  thrown  open  to  the  public  at 
large. 

"  And  pray,  gentlemen,"  an  inventor  might  fairly  reply, 
"  why  may  not  I  make  the  same  proposal  respecting  your 
goods  and  chattels,  your  clothing,  your  houses,  your  rail 
way  shares,  and  your  money  in  the  funds  ?  If  you  are 
right  in  the  interpretation  you  give  to  the  term  '  monopo 
ly,'  I  do  not  see  why  that  term  should  not  be  applied  to 
the  coats  upon  your  backs  and  the  provisions  on  your  din 
ner  tables.  With  equal  reason  I  might  argue  that  you 
unjustly  '  monopolize '  your  furniture,  and  that  you  ought 
not  in  equity  to  have  the  '  exclusive  use '  of  so  many  apart 
ments.  If '  national  advantage '  is  to  be  the  supreme  rule, 
why  should  we  not  appropriate  your  wealth,  and  the 
wealth  of  others  like  you,  to  the  liquidation  of  the  state 
debt  ?  True,  as  you  say,  you  came  honestly  by  all  this 


158        THE  EIGHT  OF  PROPERTY  IN  IDEAS. 

property :  but  so  did  I  by  my  invention.  True,  as  you 
say,  this  capital,  on  the  interest  of  which  you  subsist,  was 
acquired  by  years  of  toil — is  the  reward  of  persevering 
industry:  well,  I  may  say  the  like  of  this  machine. 
Whilst  you  were  gathering  profits,  I  was  collecting  ideas : 
the  time  you  spent  in  conning  the  prices  current,  was  em 
ployed  by  me  in  studying  mechanics ;  your  speculations 
in  new  articles  of  merchandise,  answer  to  my  experi 
ments,  many  of  which  were  costly  and  fruitless ;  when  you 
were  writing  out  your  accounts,  I  was  making  drawings  ; 
and  the  same  perseverance,  patience,  thought,  and  toil, 
which  enabled  you  to  make  a  fortune,  have  enabled  me  to 
complete  my  invention.  Like  your  wealth,  it  represents 
so  much  accumulated  labour;  and  I  am  living  upon  the 
profits  it  produces  me,  just  as  you  are  living  upon  the  in 
terest  of  your  invested  savings.  Beware,  then,  how  you 
question  my  claim.  If  I  am  a  monopolist,  so  also  are  you ; 
so  also  is  every  man.  If  I  have  no  right  to  these  products 
of  my  brain,  neither  have  you  to  those  of  your  hands  :  no 
one  can  become  the  sole  owner  of  any  article  whatever ; 
and  c  all  property  is  robbery.' " 

§  4.  They  fall  into  a  serious  error,  who  suppose  that 
the  exclusive  right  assumed  by  a  discoverer,  is  something 
taken  from  the  public.  He  who  in  any  way  increases  the 
powers  of  production,  is  seen  by  all,  save  a  few  insane 
Luddites,  to  be  a  general  benefactor  who  gives  rather  than 
takes.  The  successful  inventor  makes  a  further  conquest 
over  nature.  By  him  the  laws  of  matter  are  rendered 
still  more  subservient  to  the  wants  of  mankind.  He  econ 
omizes  labour — helps  to  emancipate  men  from  their  slavery 
to  the  needs  of  the  body — harnesses  a  new  power  to  the 
car  of  human  happiness.  He  cannot,  if  he  would,  prevent 
society  from  largely  participating  in  his  good  fortune. 
Before  he  can  realize  any  benefit  from  his  new  process  or 


159 

apparatus,  lie  must  first  confer  a  benefit  on  his  fellow  men 
— must  either  offer  them  a  better  article  at  the  price  usu 
ally  charged,  or  the  same  article  at  a  less  price.  If  he 
fails  to  do  this,  his  invention  is  a  dead  letter ;  if  he  does 
it,  he  makes  society  a  partner  in  the  new  mine  of  wealth 
he  has  opened.  For  all  the  exertion  he  has  had  in  subju 
gating  a  previously  unknown  region  of  nature,  he  simply 
asks  an  extra  proportion  of  the  fruits.  The  rest  of  man 
kind  unavoidably  come  in  for  the  main  advantage — will 
in  a  short  time  have  the  whole.  Meanwhile,  they  cannot 
without  injustice  disregard  his  claims. 

Let  us  remember,  too,  that  in  this,  as  in  other  cases, 
disobedience  to  the  moral  law  is  ultimately  detrimental  to 
all  parties — to  those  who  infringe  the  rights  of  the  indi 
vidual  as  well  as  to  the  individual  himself.  It  is  a  w  ell- 
proved  fact,  that  that  insecurity  of  material  property 
which  results  from  general  dishonesty,  inevitably  reacts 
to  the  punishment  of  all.  The  rationale  of  this  is  obvious. 
Industrial  energy  diminishes  just  in  proportion  to  the  un 
certainty  of  its  reward.  Those  who  do  not  know  that 
they  shall  reap  will  not  sow.  Instead  of  employing  it  in 
business,  capitalists  hoard  what  they  possess,  because  pro 
ductive  investments  are  dangerous.  Hence  arises  a  uni 
versal  straitness  of  means.  Every  enterprise  is  crippled 
by  want  of  confidence.  And  from  general  distrust  spring 
general  discouragement,  apathy,  idleness,  poverty,  and 
their  attendant  miseries,  involving  alike  all  grades  of  men. 
Similar  in  kind,  and  less  only  in  degree,  is  the  curse  at 
tendant  upon  insecurity  of  property  in  ideas.  Just  in  so 
far  as  the  benefits  likely  to  accrue  to  the  inventor  are  pre 
carious,  will  he  be  deterred  from  carrying  out  his  plans. 
"  If,"  thinks  he  to  himself,  "  others  are  to  enjoy  the  fruits 
of  these  wearisome  studies  and  these  numberless  experi 
ments,  why  should  I  continue  them  ?  If,  in  addition  to 
all  the  possibilities  of  failure  in  the  scheme  itself,  all  the 


160        THE  EIGHT  OF  PEOPEETY  IN  IDEAS. 

time,  trouble,  and  expense  of  my  investigations,  all  the 
chances  of  destruction  to  my  claim  by  disclosure  of  the 
plan,  all  the  heavy  costs  attendant  upon  obtaining  legal 
protection,  I  am  liable  to  be  deprived  of  my  right  by  any 
scoundrel  who  may  infringe  it  in  the  expectation  that  I 
shall  not  have  money  or  madness  enough  to  institute  a 
chancery  suit  against  him,  I  had  better  abandon  the 
project  at  once."  And  although  such  reflections  may 
often  fail  to  extinguish  the  sanguine  hopes  of  an  inventor 
— although  he  may  still  prosecute  his  scheme  to  the  end, 
regardless  of  all  risks,  yet  after  having  once  suffered  the 
losses  which  ten  to  one  society  will  inflict  upon  him,  he 
will  take  good  care  never  again  to  enter  upon  a  similar 
undertaking.  Whatever  other  ideas  he  may  then  or  sub 
sequently  entertain — some  of  them  most  likely  valuable 
ones — will  remain  undeveloped  and  probably  die  with 
him.  Did  mankind  know  the  many  important  discover 
ies  which  the  ingenious  are  prevented  from  giving  to  the 
world  by  the  cost  of  obtaining  legal  protection,  or  by  the 
distrust  of  that  protection  if  obtained — were  people  duly 
to  appreciate  the  consequent  check  put  upon  the  develop 
ment  of  the  means  of  production — and  could  they  prop 
erly  estimate  the  loss  thereby  entailed  upon  themselves, 
they  would  begin  to  see  that  the  recognition  of  the  right 
of  property  in  ideas,  is  only  less  important  than  the  rec 
ognition  of  the  right  of  property  in  goods. 

§  5.  In  consequence  of  the  probability,  or  perhaps 
we  may  say  the  certainty,  that  the  causes  leading  to  the 
evolution  of  a  new  idea  in  our  mind,  will  eventually  pro 
duce  a  like  result  in  some  other  mind,  the  claim  above 
set  forth  must  not  be  admitted  without  limitation.  Many 
have  remarked  the  tendency  that  exists  for  an  important 
invention  or  discovery  to  be  made  by  independent  investi 
gators  nearly  at  the  same  time.  There  is  nothing  really 


IT   IS    A    QUALIFIED    EIGHT.  161 

mysterious  in  this.  A  certain  state  state  of  knowledge,  a 
recent  advancement  in  science,  the  occurrence  of  some 
new  social  want — these  form  the  conditions  under  which 
minds  of  similar  characters  are  stimulated  to  like  trains  of 
thought,  ending  as  they  are  prone  to  do  in  the  same  re 
sult.  Such  being  the  fact,  there  arises  a  qualification  to 
the  right  of  property  in  ideas,  which  it  seems  difficult  and 
even  impossible  to  specify  definitely.  The  laws  of  patent 
and  copyright,  express  this  qualification  by  confining  the 
inventor's  or  -author's  privilege  within  a  certain  term  of 
years.  But  in  what  way  the  length  of  that  term  may 
be  found  with  correctness  there  is  no  saying.  In  the 
mean  time,  as  already  pointed  out  (p.  128),  such  a  diffi 
culty  does  not  in  the  least  militate  against  the  right 
itself. 


CHAPTER    XII. 

THE  EIGHT  OF  PEOPEETY  IN  CHAEACTEE. 

§  1.  Could  we  accurately  analyze  the  stimulus  by 
which  men  are  usually  impelled  to  action — could  we  deter 
mine  the  proportions  of  the  several  motives  which  go  to 
make  up  that  stimulus,  we  should  probably  find  that 
amongst  those  classes  removed  from  the  absolute  pressure 
of  bodily  wants,  its  chief  component  is  a  desire  for  the 
good  opinion,  regard,  or  admiration  of  others.<xWhether 
we  observe  this  feeling  as  shown  by  the  tattooed  savage 
in  his  willingness  to  undergo  torture  that  he  may  obtain 
a  character  for  fortitude,  and  to  risk  any  amount  of  danger 
that  he  may  be  called  brave  ;  or  whether,  turning  to  civ 
ilized  life,  we  contemplate  that  ambition  so  universally 
exhibited  by  poets,  orators,  statesmen,  artists,  soldiers, 
and  others  known  to  fame ;  or  whether,  by  taking  off  its 


162     THE  EIGHT  OF  PROPERTY  IN  CHARACTER. 

disguises,  we  discover  the  true  nature  of  that  insane  eager 
ness  with  which  people  pursue  wealth ;  we  are  alike 
instructed  in  the  fact  that,  after  those  instincts  immedi 
ately  connected  with  the  preservation  of  life,  love  of 
approbation  exercises  the  greatest  influence  over  human 
conduct.' 

Reputation,  therefore,  as  a  thing  which  men  strive  so  in 
cessantly  to  acquire  and  preserve,  may  be  regarded  as  prop 
erty.  Earned  like  other  property  by  labour,  care,  and 
perseverance — similarly  surrounding  its  owner  with  facili 
ties  for  securing  his  ends,  and  affording  him  as  it  does  a 
constant  supply  of  food  for  divers  of  his  desires ;  the 
esteem  of  others  is  a  possession,  having  many  analogies 
with  possessions  of  a  more  palpable  nature.  An  estate  in 
the  general  good-will,  appears  to  many  of  more  worth 
than  one  in  land.  By  some  great  action  to  have  bought 
golden  opinions,  may  be  a  richer  source  of  gratification 
than  to  have  obtained  bank  stock  or  railway  shares. 
There  are  those  to  whom  a  crown  of  bay  leaves  would  be 
a  greater  treasure  than  a  fat  legacy.  Titles  had  once  a 
definite  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence  price;  and  if  they  are 
now  becoming  depreciated  in  value  when  compared  with 
the  honours  spontaneously  awarded  by  the  public  voice, 
it  is  that  they  do  not  represent  so  large  an  amount  of 
genuine  approbation.  Men  therefore  who  cultivate  charac 
ter,  and  live  on  the  harvests  of  praise  they  reap — men  who 
have  invested  their  labour  in  noble  deeds,  and  receive  by 
way  of  interest  the  best  wishes  and  cordial  greetings  of 
society,  may  be  considered  as  having  claims  to  these 
rewards  of  good  conduct,  resembling  the  claims  of  others 
to  the  rewards  of  their  industry.  Of  course  this  is  true 
not  only  of  such  as  are  distinguished  by  unusual  worth ; 
it  is  true  of  all.  To  the  degree  in  which  each  has  shown 
probity,  kindness,  truth,  or  other  virtue,  and  has  gained 
amongst  his  fellows  a  reputation  for  it,  we  must  hold  him 


MONEY  VALUE  OF  A  GOOD  NAME.         163 

entitled  to  the  character  he  has  thus  fairly  won,  as  to 
a  species  of  property ;  a  species  of  property,  too,  which, 
without  quoting  the  hackneyed  saying  of  lago,  may  be 
described  as  of  greater  value  than  property  of  any  other 
kind. 

Those  who  hesitate  to  admit  tljat  a  good  name  is 
property*  should  remember  that  it«-has  really  a  money 
value.  .  To  be  accounted  honest  is  to  be  preferred  as  one 
with  whom  commercial  dealings  may  be  most  safely 
carried  on.  7  Whoso  is  said  to  be  particularly  industrious, 
is  likely,  other  things  being  equal,  to  get  better  pay  than 
his  competitors.  The  celebrity  attending  great  intellectual 
capacity,  introduces  those  possessing  it  to  responsible  and 
remunerative  situations.  It  is  quite  allowable,  therefore, 
to  classify  reputation  under  this  head,  seeing  that,  like 
capital,  it  may  bring  its  owner  an  actual  revenue  in  hard 
cash. 

§  2.  The  position  that  a  good  character  is  property 
being  granted,  a  right  to  the  possession  of  it  when  fairly 
earned,  is  demonstrable  by  arguments  similar  to  those 
used  in  the  two  preceding  chapters.*-  Such  character  is 
attainable  without  any  infringement  of  the  freedom  of 
others ;  is  indeed  a  concrete  result  of  habitual  regard  for 
that  freedom ;  and  being  thus  a  source  of  gratification 
which  its  owner  legitimately  obtains — a  species  of  prop 
erty,  as  we  say — it  can  no  more  be  taken  away  from  him 
without  a  breach  of  equity,  than  property  of  other  kinds 
can.  This  conclusion  manifestly  serves  as  the  foundation 
for  a  law  of  libel. 

§  3.  Possibly  this  reasoning  will  be  thought  incon 
clusive.  The  position  that  character  is  property  may  be 
considered  open  to  dispute ;  and  it  must  be  confessed  that 
the  propriety  of  so  classifying  it  is  not  proveable  with 


164  THE   EIGHT  OF   EXCHANGE. 

logical  precision.  Should  any  urge  that  this  admission  is 
fatal,  to  the  argument,  they  have  the  alternative  of  regard 
ing  slander  as  a  breach,  not  of  that  primary  law  which 
forbids  us  to  trench  upon  each  other's  spheres  of  activity, 
but  of  that  secondary  one  which  forbids  us  to  inflict  pain 
on  each  other.  If  the  destruction  of  a  fellow-man's  de 
served  reputation  does  not  amount  to  a  trespass  against 
the  law  of  equal  freedom,  then  the  flagitiousness  of  such 
an  act  remains  to  be  treated  of  in  that  supplementary 
department  of  morals  elsewhere  generalized  under  the 
term  negative  beneficence.  Of  these  alternatives  each 
must  make  his  own  choice ;  for  there  seems  to  be  no  way 
of  deciding  between  them  with  certainty.  And  here 
indeed  we  meet  with  an  illustration  of  a  remark  pre 
viously  made  (p.  86),  namely,  that  the  division  of  mor 
ality  into  separate  sections,  though  needful  for  our  due 
comprehension  of  it,  is  yet  artificial ;  and  that  the  lines 
of  demarcation  are  not  always  capable  of  being  main 
tained. 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

THE    RIGHT    OF   EXCHANGE. 

§  1.  ^Freedom  to  exchange  his  property  for  the  prop 
erty  of  others,  is  manifestly  included  in  a  man's  general^ 
freedom?  In  claiming  this  as  his  right,  ho  in  no  way  j 
transgresses  the  proper  limit  put  to  his  sphere  of  action 
by  the  like  spheres  of  action  of  others.  The  two  parties 
in  a  trade  transaction,  whilst  doing  all  that  they  will  to 
do,  are  not  assuming  more  liberty  than  they  leave  to 
others.  Indeed  their  act  ends  with  themselves — does  not 
aifect  the  condition  of  the  bystanders  at  all — leaves  these 
as  much  power  to  pursue  the  objects  of  their  desires  as 


FEEEDOM   OF   CONTRACT.  165 

before.     Hence,  exchanges  may  be  made  in  complete  con 
formity  with  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

Possibly  it  will  be  said,  that  in  cases  where  several 
men  are  wishing  to  deal  with  the  same  man,  and  a  bargain 
is  ultimately  made  between  him  and  one  of  them,  the  rest 
are  by  this  event  excluded  from  a  certain  prospective  field 
for  the  fulfilment  of  their  w^ants,  which  was  previously 
open  to  them ;  and  that  consequently  they  have  had  the 
liberty  to  exercise  their  faculties  diminished  by  the  suc 
cess  of  their  competitor.  This,  however,  is  a  distorted 
view  of  the  matter.  Let  us  for  a  moment  turn  back  to 
first  principles.  What  is  it  that  we  have  to  do  ?  We 
have  to  divide  out  equally  amongst  all  men,  the  whole  of 
that  freedom  which  the  conditions  of  social  existence 
afford.  Observe,  then,  in  respect  of  trade  relationships, 
how  much  falls  to  the  share  of  each.  Evidently,  each  is 
free  to  offer ;  each  is  free  to  accept ;  each  is  free  to  refuse ; 
for  each  may  do  these  to  any  extent  without  preventing 
his  neighbours  from  doing  the  like  to  the  same  extent,  and 
at  the  same  time.  /But  no  one  may  do  more;  no  one  may 
force  another  to  part  with  his  goods ;  no  one  may  force 
another  to  take  a  specified  price ;  for  no  one  can  do  so  with 
out  assuming  more  liberty  of  action  than  the  man  whom  he 
thus  treats.  ">If,  therefore,  every  one  is  entitled  to  offer,  to 
accept,  and  to  refuse,  but  to  do  nothing  more,  it  is  clear 
that,  under  the  circumstances  above  put,  the  closing  of  an 
agreement  between  two  of  the  parties  implies  no  infringe 
ment  of  the  claims  of  the  disappointed  ones;  seeing  that 
each  of  them  remains  as  free  as  ever,  to  offer,  accept,  and 
refuse. 

§  2.  To  say  that,  as  a  corollary  from  this,  all  inter 
ference  between  those  who  would  traffic  with  each  other 
amounts  to  a  breach  of  equity,  is  hardly  needful.  Nor  is 
there  any  occasion  here  to  assign  reasons  why  the  recogni- 


166  THE   EIGHT   OF   FREE    SPEECH. 

0 

tion  of  liberty  of  trade  is  expedient.  Harmonizing  as  it 
does  with  the  settled  convictions  of  thinking  people,  the 
foregoing  conclusion  may  safely  be  left  to  stand  unsup 
ported.  Some  remarks  upon  the  limits  it  puts  to  legisla 
tion  are  indeed  called  for.  But  these  will  come  in  more 
appropriately  elsewhere. 


CHAPTER    XIY. 

THE    EIGHT    OF   FEEE    SPEECH. 

§  1.  The  utterance  of  thought  being  one  species  of 
action,  there  arises  from  the  proposition  that  every  man  is 
free  within  specified  bounds  to  do  what  he  wills,  the  self- 
evident  corollary,  that,  with  the  like  qualification,  he  is 
free  to  say  what  he  wills ;  or,  in  other  words,  as  the  rights 
of  his  fellow-men  form  the  only  legitimate  restraint  upon 
his  deeds,  so  likewise  do  they  form  the  only  legitimate 
restraint  upon  .Ma  words1.. 

There  are  two  modes  in  which  speech  may  exceed  the 
ordained  limits.  ^  It  may  be  used  for  the  propagation  of 
slander,  which,  as  we  have  seen  in  a  foregoing  chapter, 
involves  a  disregard  of  moral  obligation;  or^it  may  be 
used  in  inciting  and  directing  another  to  injure  a  third 
party.  In  this  last  case,  the  instigator,  although  not 
personally  concerned  in  the  trespass  proposed  by  him, 
must  be  considered  as  having  virtually  committed  it.  We 
should  not  exonerate  an  assassin  who  pretended  that  his 
dagger  was  guilty  of  the  murder  laid  to  his  charge  rather 
than  himself.  We  should  reply,  that  the  having  moved  a 
dagger  with  the  intention  of  taking  away  life,  constituted 
his  crime.  Following  up  the  idea,  we  must  also  assert 
that  he  who,  by  bribes  or  persuasion,  moved  the  man  who 


IN   WHAT   ITS   VIOLATION    CONSISTS.  167 

moved  the  dagger,  is  equally  guilty  with  his  agent?7  He 
had  just  the  same  intention,  and  similarly  used  means  for 
its  fulfilment ;  the  only  difference  being  that  he  produced 
death  through  a  more  complicated  mechanism  As,  how 
ever,  no  one  will  argue  that  the  interposing  of  an  addi 
tional  lever  between  a  motive  force  and  its  ultimate  effect, 
alters  the  relationship  between  the  two,  so  neither  can  it 
be  said  that  he  who  gets  a  wrong  done  by  proxy,  is  less 
guilty  than  if  he  had  done  it  himself.  Hence,  whoso 
suggests  or  urges  the  infraction  of  another's  rights,  must 
be  field  to  have  transgressed  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

...  Liberty  of  speech,  then,  like  liberty  of  action,  may  be 
claimed  by  each,  to  the  fullest  extent  compatible  with  the 
equal  rights  of  all.  Exceeding  the  limits  thus  arising, 
it  becomes  immoral.  Within  them,  no  restraint  of  it  is 
permissible. 

§  2.  A  new  Areopagitica,  were  it  possible,  to  write 
one,  would  surely  be  needless  in  our  age  of  the  world  and 
in  this  country.  And  yet  there  still  prevails,  and  that  too 
amongst  men  who  plume  themselves  on  their  liberality, 
no  small  amount  of  the  feeling  which  Milton  combated  in 
his  celebrated  essay.  Notwithstanding  the  abatement  of 
intolerance,  and  the  growth  of  free  institutions,  the 
repressive  policy  of  the  past  has  occasional  advocates 
even  now.  S  Were  it  put  to  the  vote,  probably  not  a  few 
would  say  ay  to  the  proposition,  that  the  public  safety 
requires  some  restriction  to  be  placed  011  the  freedom  of 
speech.  The  imprisonment  of  a  socialist  for  blasphemy 
some  few  years  since,  called  forth  no  indignant  protest 
against  the  violation  of  "  the  liberty  of  unlicensed  "  speak 
ing,  but  was  even  approved  by  staunch  maintainers  of 
religious  freedom.  Many  would  like  to  make  it  a  penal 
offence  to  preach  discontent  to  the  people  ;  and  there  are 
not  wanting  others  who  would  haag  up  a  few  demagogues 


168          THE  EIGHT  OF  FREE  SPEECH. 

by  way  of  scarecrows.  *  Let  us  look  at  what  may  be  s  aid 
by  the  advocates  of  a  mild  censorship  on  behalf  of  their 
opinions. 

§  3.  It  is  an  assertion  often  made,  as  of  indisputable 
truth,  that  government  ought  to  guarantee  to  its  subjects 
"  security  and  a  sense  of  security."  From  which  maxim 
to  the  inference  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  magistrate  to 
keep  an  ear  open  to  the  sayings  of  popular  orators,  and  to 
stop  violent  declamation,  as  being  calculated  to  create 
alarm,  is  an  obvious  step.  Were  the  premises  good,  the 
deduction  might  pass ;  but  the  premises  are  more  than 
questionable.  That  it  is  the  special  function  of  the  legis 
lator  to  guard  every  man  in  the  peaceable  possession  of  his 
person  and  property,  all  admit ;  but  that  the  legislator  is 
called  upon  to  quiet  the  fears  aroused  by  every  trilling 
excitement,  is  a  notion  almost  too  ridiculous  for  serious 
argument/  Consider  a  moment  to  what  it  leads.  (•  Coupled 
as  are  the  ideas  "  security  and  a  sense  of  security,"  we 
must  suppose  that  as  governors  are  required  to  carry 
home  "  security  "  to  every  individual,  so  also  may  every 
individual  claim  the  "  sense  of  security  "  at  their  hands. 
Here  is  a  pretty  prospect  for  overburdened  premiers !  If 
such  a  doctrine  be  true,  where  shall  the  cares  of  the  states 
man  end  ?  Must  he  listen  to  the  apprehensions  of  every 
hypochondriac,  in  whose  morbid  imagination  Reform  is 
pictured  as  a  grim  ogre  of  anthropophagous  propensities, 
with  pikes  for  claws  and  guillotines  for  teeth  ?  If  not, 
why  not?  " Sense  of  security "  in  such  an  one  has  been 
destroyed  by  the  violent  denunciations  of  some  hot 
patriot ;  he  wishes  his  trepidations  allayed  by  the  sup 
pression  of  what  he  thinks  dangerous  speaking;  and, 
according  to  the  hypothesis,  his  wishes  ought  to  be 
obeyed.-^ On  the  same  grounds  all  agitation  should  be 
extinguished,  for  there  are  invariably  some — and  not 


THE  "SENSE  OF  SECURITY."  169 

a  small  number  either — who  regard  the  discussion  of 
every  public  question  that  comes  uppermost  with  dread, 
and  predict  all  kinds  of  disasters  from  its  continuance. 
Old  women  of  both  sexes  working  themselves  into  a  state 
of  great  tribulation  over  the  terrible  vaticinations  of  a 
Standard,  or  the  melancholy  wail  ings  of  a  Herald,  would 
fain  have  put  down  the  Free  Trade  propaganda ;  and  if 
their  "  sense  of  security  "  had  been  duly  consulted,  they 
"should  have  had  their  way.  Religious  disabilities  too 
ought,  for  the  like  reason,  to  have  been  still  maintained, 
for  the  proposal  to  repeal  them  was  productive  of  extreme 
consternation  to  multitudes  of  weak-minded  people. 
Prophecies  were  rife  of  the  return  of  papal  persecutions ; 
every  horror  narrated  in  the  Book  of  Martyrs  was  ex 
pected  to  be  acted  over  afresh ;  and  an  epidemic  fright 
invalided  its  thousands.  Credulous  individuals  listened 
with  raised  eyebrows  and  pendant  jaws  to  the  dismal 
tales  of  some  incipient  Titus  Gates,  and  straightway  had 
visions  of  fire  and  faggots;  each  saw  himself  in  Smithfield 
with  a  stake  at  his  back  and  a  torch  at  his  feet;  or 
dreamed  he  was  in  the  torture-chamber  of  an  inquisition, 
and  awoke  in  a  cold  prespiration  to  find  that  he  had  mis 
taken  the  squeak  of  a  mouse  for  the  creak  of  a  thumb 
screw.  Well,  here 'was  a  woful  loss  of  the  "sense  of 
security;"  and  therefore  the  authorities  ought  to  have 
stopped  the  movement  for  Catholic  emancipation,  by  gag 
ging  all  its  advocates,  fettering  its  press,  and  preventing 
its  meetings. 

It  is  useless  to  say  that  these  are  exaggerations,  and 
that  the  alarms  of  nervous  valetudinarians  or  foolish  bigots 
are  to  be  disregarded.  If  the  fears  of  a  hundred  are  not 
to  be  attended  to,  why  those  of  a  thousand  ?  If  not  those 
of  a  thousand,  why  those  of  ten  thousand  ?  How  shall 
the  line  be  drawn  ?  where  is  the  requisite  standard  ?  who 
shall  tell  when  the  sense  of  msecurity  has  become  general 


170  THE  EIGHT  OF  FREE  SPEECH. 

enough  to  merit  respect?  Is  it  to  be  when  the  majority 
participate  in  it  ?  If  so,  who  shall  decide  when  they  do 
this?  Perhaps  it  will  be  said  that  the  apprehensions  must 
be  reasonable  ones.  Good;  but  who  is  to  determine 
whether  they  are  so  or  not?  Where  is  the  pope  who 
shall  give  an  infallible  judgment  on  such  a  matter  ?  To 
all  which  questions  those  who  would  make  the  preserva 
tion  of  a  "  sense  of  security  "  the  limit  to  liberty  of  speech, 
must  first  find  answers. 

§  4.  Of  those  animadversions  upon  state  affairs 
which  constitute  the  legal  offence  of  bringing  government 
into  contempt,  and  of  which  offence,  lay  the  way,  all 
parties  might  be  accused,  from  a  chartist  orator,  to  the 
leader  of  the  opposition — from  the  Titnes^  with  its  bur 
lesques  upon  the  pitiful  results  of  an  annual  "  great  talk," 
to  its  facetious  contemporary  who  quizzes  the  eccentrici 
ties  of  a  versatile  ex-chancellor — of  such  animadversions 
the  only  needful  question  to  be  asked  is — are  they  de 
served  ?  Are  the  allegations  contained  in  them  true  ?  If 
it  can  be  shown  that  they  are  not — that  is,  if  it  can  be 
shown  that  the  parties  referred  to  have  been  unjustly 
aspersed — that  is,  if  it  can  be  shown  that  a  violation  of 
the  law  has  been  committed — there  is  an  end  of  the  mat 
ter,  so  far  as  the  moralist  is  concerned.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  should  they  prove  to  be  substantially  correct,  on 
what  grounds  shall  the  suppression  of  them  be  defended  ? 
That  which  is  really  contemptible  ought  to  be  exposed  to 
contempt ;  and,  if  so,  derogatory  charges  ought  to  have 
full  publicity.  <To  argue  otherwise,  is  to  take  up  the 
Machiavellian  position,  that  it  is  right  for  the  legislature 
to  be  an  imposture,  an  "  organized  hypocrisy  " — that  it  is 
necessary  for  a  nation  to  be  cheated  by  the  semblance  of 
virtue  when  there  is  no  reality — that  public  opinion  ought 
to  be  in  error  rather  than  in  truth — or  that  it  is  well  for 
the  people  to  believe  a  lie !  - 


FALSE   DEE  AD   OF   DANGEE.  171 

§  5.  There  may  be  much  danger  in  placing  an 
invalid  under  the  regimen  proper  to  people  in  robust 
health.  For  a  dyspeptic,  chicken-broth  may  be  in  all 
respects  better  suited  than  more  substantial  fare.  And 
whoso  is  suffering  under  an  attack  of  influenza,  will  do 
wisely  to  avoid  a  blustering  north-wester,  or  even  a  gentle 
breeze  from  the  south.  But  he  would  be  thought  more 
than  silly  who  inferred  from  such  facts  that  solid  food 
and  fresh  air  are  bad  things.  To  ascribe  any  evil 
results  to  these,  rather  than  to  the  unhealthy  condition 
of  the  patients,  would  imply  extremely  crude  ideas  of 
causation. 

/  Similarly  crude,  however,  are  the  ideas  of  those  who 
infer  that  unlimited  liberty  of  speech  is  improper,  because 
productive  in  certain  states  of  society  of  disastrous  results^ 
It  is  to  the  abnormal  condition  of  the  body  politic  that  all ' 
evils  arising  from  an  unrestrained  expression  of  opinion 
must  be  attributed,  and  not  to  the  unrestrained  express 
ion  itself.  Under  a  sound  social-regime  and  its  accom 
panying  contentment,  nothing  is  to  be  feared  from  the 
most  uncontrolled  utterance  of  thought  and  feeling.  /  On 
the  other  hand  it  may  happen  that  where  disease  exists, 
exposure  of  the  sore  places  of  the  state  to  the  cold  breath 
of  criticism,  will  superinduce  alarming  symptoms.  Buj^ 
what  then  ?  A  Louis  Philippe,  a  General  Cavaignac,  or  a 
Louis  Napoleon,  may  find  excuse  in  a  corrupted  and  dis 
organized  state  of  things  for  espionage,  censorships,  and 
the  suppression  of  public  meetings.  But  what  then  ?  If 
a  nation  cannot  be  governed  011  principles  of  pure  equity, 
so  much  the  worse  for  the  nation.  Those  principles  re 
main  true  notwithstanding.  As  elsewhere  pointed  out 
(p.  50),  there  must  necessarily  exist  incongruity  between 
the  perfect  law  and  the  imperfect  man.  And  if  evils  are 
entailed  upon  a  people  by  immediate  and  entire  recogni 
tion  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  in  the  matter  of 


172  FURTHER   RIGHTS. 

speech  as  well  as  in  that  of  action,  such  evils  are  merely 
significant  of  the  incomplete  adaptation  of  that  people  to 
the  social  state,  and  not  of  any  defect  in  the  law. 


CHAPTEE   XV. 

FURTHER   RIGHTS. 

DID  circumstances  demand  it,  sundry  other  chapters  of 
the  same  nature  as  the  preceding  ones,  could  be  added. 
"Were  this  France,  it  might  be  needful  formally  to  deduce 
from  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  the  right  to  move  from  place 
to  place  without  leave  of  a  government  official.  In  address 
ing  the  Chinese,  some  proof  that  a  man  is  at  liberty  to 
cut  his  clothes  after  whatever  fashion  may  best  suit  him, 
would  perhaps  be  called  for."  And,  similarly,  there  might 
be  found  in  different  times  and  places,  many  other  directions 
in  which  the  law  of  equal  freedom  required  asserting. 
But  it  is  unnecessary  now  to  repeat  over  again  the  reaspn 
ing  so  many  times  used.  These  that  we  call  rights,  'are 
nothing  but  artificial  divisions  of  the  general  claim  to' 
exercise  the  faculties — applications  of  that  general  claim 
to  particular  cases ;  and  each  of  them  is  proved  in  the 
same  way,  by  showing  that  the  particular  exercise  of 
faculties  referred  to,  is  possible  without  preventing  the 
like  exercise  of  faculties  by  other  persons.  The  reader 
has  already  seen  the  most  important  rights  thus  estab 
lished;  and  the  establishment  of  such  minor  ones  as 
have  not  been  touched  upon,  may  safely  be  left  with 
himself. 


THE  EIGHTS   OF   THE   SEXES   EQUAL.  173 

CHAPTEE   XYI. 

THE   EIGHTS    OF    WOMEN. 

§  1.  Equity  knows  no  difference  of  sex.  In  its 
vocabulary  the  word  man  must  be  understood  in  a 
generic,  and  not  in  a  specific  sense.  The  law  of  equal 
freedom  manifestly  applies  to  the  whole  race — female  as 
well  as  male.  The  same  d  priori  reasoning  which  estab 
lishes  that  law  for  men  (Chaps.  III.  and  IV.),  may  be 
used  with  equal  cogency  on  behalf  of  women.  The  Moral 
Sense,  by  virtue  of  which  the  masculine  mind  responds  to 
that  law,  exists  in  the  feminine  mind  as  well.  Hence  the 
several  rights  deducible  from  that  law  must  appertain 
equally  to  both  sexes. 

This  might  have  been  thought  a  self-evident  truth, 
needing  only  to  be  stated  to  meet  with  universal  accepta 
tion.  There  are  many,  however,  who  either  tacitly,  or  in 
so  many  words,  express  their  dissent  from  it.  For  w^at 
reasons  they  do  so,  does  not  appear.  They  admit  the 
axiom,  that  human  happiness  is  the  Divine  will;  from 
which  axiom,  what  we  call  rights  are  primarily  derived. 
And  why  the  differences  of  bodily  organization,  and  those 
trifling  mental  variations  which  distinguish  female  from 
male,  should  exclude  one-half  of  the  race  from  the  benefits 
of  this  ordination,  remains  to  be  shown.  The  onus  of 
proof  lies  on  those  who  affirm  that  such  is  the  fact ;  and 
it  would  be  perfectly  in  order  to  assume  that  the  law 
of  equal  freedom  comprehends  both  sexes,  until  the 
contrary  has  been  demonstrated.  But  without  taking 
advantage  of  this,  suppose  we  go  at  once  into  the  con. 
troversy. 

Three  positions  only  are  open  to  us.     It  may  be  said 


THE   EIGHTS   OF   WOMEN. 

that  women  have  no  rights  at  all — that  their  rights  are 
not  so  great  as  those  of  men — or  that  they  are  equal  to 
those  of  men. 

Whoever  maintains  the  first  of  these  dogmas,  that 
women  have  no  rights  at  all,  must  show  that  the  Creator 
intended  women  to  be  wholly  at  the  mercy  of  men — their 
happiness,  their  liberties,  their  lives,  at  men's  disposal ;  or, 
in  other  words,  that  they  were  meant  to  be  treated  as 
creatures  of  an  inferior  order.  Few  will  have  hardihood 
to  assert  this. 

From  the  second  proposition,  that  the  rights  of  women 
are  not  so  great  as  those  of  men,  there  immediately  arise 
such  queries  as — If  they  are  not  so  great,  by  how  much 
are  they  less  ?  What  is  the  exact  ratio  between  the  legiti 
mate,  claims  of  the  two  sexes  ?  How  shall  we  tell  which 
rights  are  common  to  both,  and  where  those  of  the  male 
exceed  those  of  the  female  ?  Who  can  show  us  a  scale 
that  will  serve  for  the  apportionment  ?  Or,  putting  the 
question  practically,  it  is  required  to  determine  by  some 
logical  method,  whether  the  Turk  is  justified  in  plunging 
an  offending  Circassian  into  the  Bosphorus  ?  whether  the 
rights  of  women  were  violated  by  that  Athenian  law, 
which  allowed  a  citizen  under  certain  circumstances  to 
sell  his  daughter  or  sister?  whether  our  own  statute, 
which  permits  a  man  to  beat  his  wife  in  moderation,  and 
to  imprison  her  in  any  room  in  his  house,  is  morally  defens 
ible  ?  whether  it  is  equitable  that  a  married  woman 
should  be  incapable  of  holding  property  ?  whether  a  hus 
band  may  justly  take  possession  of  his  wife's  earnings 
aorainst  her  will,  as  our  law  allows  him  to  do  ? — and  so 

& 

forth.  These,  and  a  multitude  of  similar  problems,  pre 
sent  themselves  for  solution.  Some  principle  rooted  in  the 
nature  of  things  has  to  be  found,  by  which  they  may 
be  scientifically  decided — decided,  not  on  grounds  of 
expediency,  but  in  some  definite,  philosophical  way. 


THEIR  MENTAL   CAPABILITIES.  175 

Does  any  one  holding  the  doctrine  that  women's  rights 
are  not  so  great  as  men's,  think  he  can  find  such  a 
principle  ? 

If  not,  there  remains  no  alternative  but  to  take  up  the 
third  position — that  the  rights  of  women  are  equal  with 
those  of  men. 

§  2.  Whoso  urges  the  mental  inferiority  of  women 
in  bar  of  their  claim  to  equal  rights  with  men,  may  be 
met  in  various  ways. 

In  the  first  place,  the  alleged  fact  may  be  disputed.  A 
defender  of  her  sex  might  name  many  whose  achievements 
in  government,  in  science,  in  literature,  and  in  art,  have 
obtained  no  small  share  of  renown.  Powerful  and  saga 
cious  queens  the  world  has  seen  in  plenty,  from  Zenobia, 
down  to  the  empresses  Catherine  and  Maria  Theresa.  In 
the  exact  sciences,  Mrs.  Somerville,  Miss  Herschel,  and 
Miss  Zornlin,  have  gained  applause ;  in  political  economy, 
Miss  Martineau;  in  general  philosophy,  Madame  de  Stae'l; 
in  politics,  Madame  Roland.  Poetry  has  its  Tighes,  its 
Hemanses,  its  Landons,  its  Brownings ;  the  drama  its 
Joanna  Baillie;  and  fiction  its  Austens,  Bremers,  Gores, 
Dudevants,  &c.,  without  end.  In  sculpture,  fame  has 
been  acquired  by  a  princess  ;  a  picture  like  "  The  Moment 
ous  Question "  is  tolerable  proof  of  female  capacity  for 
painting ;  and  on  the  stage,  it  is  certain  that  women  are 
on  a  level  with  men,  if  they  do  not  even  bear  away  the 
palm.  Joining  to  such  facts  the  important  consideration, 
that  women  have  always  been,  and  are  still,  placed  at  a 
disadvantage  in  every  department  of  learning,  thought,  or 
skill — seeing  that  they  are  not  admissible  to  the  academies 
and  universities  in  which  men  get  their  training ;  that  the 
kind  of  life  they  have  to  look  forward  to,  does  not  present 
so  gfeat  a  range  of  ambitions ;  that  they  are  rarely  ex 
posed  to  that  most  powerful  of  all  stimuli — necessity; 


170  THE   EIGHTS   OF   WOMEN. 

that  the  education  custom  dictates  for  them  is  one  that 
leaves  uncultivated  many  of  the  higher  faculties;  and 
that  the  prejudice  against  blue-stockings,  hitherto  so  prev 
alent  amongst  men,  has  greatly  tended  to  deter  women 
from  the  pursuit  of  literary  honours  ; — adding  these  con 
siderations  to  the  above  facts,  we  shall  see  good  reason  for 
thinking  that  the  alleged  inferiority  of  the  feminine  mind, 
is  by  no  means  self-evident. 

But,  waiving  this  point,  let  us  contend  with  the  propo 
sition  on  its  own  premises.  Let  it  be  granted  that  the 
intellect  of  woman  is  less  profound  than  that  of  man — that 
she  is  more  uniformly  ruled  by  feeling,  more  impulsive, 
and  less  reflective,  than  man  is — let  all  this  be  granted ; 
and  let  us  now  see  what  basis  such  an  admision  aifords  to 
the  doctrine,  that  the  rights  of  women  are  not  coexten 
sive  with  those  of  men. 

1.  If  rights  are  to  be  meted  out  to  the  two  sexes  in  the 
ratio  of  their  respective  amounts  of  intelligence,  t<hen  must 
the  same  system  be  acted  upon,  in  the  apportionment  of 
rights  between  man  and  man.     Whence  must  proceed  all 
those  multiplied  perplexities  already  pointed  out.     (See 
pp.  125  and  126.) 

2.  In  like  manner,  it  will  follow,  that  as  there  are  here 
and  there  women  of  unquestionably  greater  ability  than 
the  average  of  men,  some  women  ought  to  have  greater 
rights  than  some  men. 

3.  Wherefore^  instead  of  a  certain  fixed  allotment  of 
rights  to  all  males  and  another  to  all  females,  the  hypo 
thesis  itself  involves  an  infinite  gradation  of  rightSj  irre 
spective  of  sex  entirely,  and  sends  us  once  more  in  search 
of  those  unattainable  desiderata — a  standard  by  which  to 
measure  capacity,  and  another  by  which  to  measure  rights. 

Not  only,  however,  does  the  theory  thus  fall  to  pieces 
under  the  mere  process  of  inspection  ;  it  is  absurd  on  the 
very  face  of  it,  when  freed  from  the  disguise  of  hackneyed 


BELIEF   AND   CHAEACTEE.  177 

phraseology.  For  what  is  it  that  we  mean  by  rights.? 
Nothing  else  than  freedom  to  exercise  the  faculties.  And 
what  is  the  meaning  of  the  assertion  that  woman  is  men 
tally  inferior  to  man  ?  Simply  that  her  faculties  are  less 
powerful.  What  then  does  the  dogma,  that  because 
woman  is  mentally  inferior  to  man  she  has  less  extensive 
rights,  amount  to  ?  Just  this — that  because  woman 
has  weaker  faculties  than  man,  she  ought  not  to  have 
like  liberty  with  him,  to  exercise  the  faculties  she  has  ! 

§  3.  Belief  always  bears  the  impress  of  character — 
is,  in  fact,  its  product.  Anthropomorphism  sufficiently 
proves  this.  Men's  wishes  eventually  get  expressed  in 
their  faiths — their  real  faiths,  that  is ;  not  their  normal 
ones.  Pull  to  pieces  a  man's  Theory  of  Things,  and  you 
will  find  it  based  upon  facts  collected  at  the  suggestion  of 
his  desires.  A  fiery  passion  consumes  all  evidences 
opposed  to  its  gratification,  and  fusing  together  those  that 
serve  its  purpose,  casts  them  into  weapons  by  which  to 
achieve  its  end.  There  is  no  deed  so  vicious  but  what  the 
actor  makes  for  himself  an  excuse  to  justify ;  and  if  the 
deed  is  often  repeated,  such  excuse  becomes  a  creed.  The 
vilest  transactions  on  record — Bartholomew  massacre  and 
the  like — have  had  defenders ;  nay,  have  been  inculcated 
as  fulfilments  of  the  Divine  will.  There  is  wisdom  in 
the  fable  which  represents  the  wolf  as  raising  accusations 
against  the  lamb  before  devouring  it.  It  is  always  thus 
amongst  men.  No  invader  ever  raised  standard,  but  per 
suaded  himself  that  he  had  a  just  cause.  Sacrifices  and 
prayers  have  preceded  every  military  expedition,  from 
one  of  Cesar's  campaigns,  down  to  a  border  foray.  God 
is  on  our  side,  is  the  universal  cry.  Each  of  two  conflict 
ing  nations  consecrates  its  flags ;  and  whichever  conquers 
sings  a  Te  Deum.  Attila  conceived  himself  to  have  a 
"  divine  claim  to  the  dominion  of  the  earth :  "  the  Span- 
8* 


178  THE   EIGHTS    OF   WOMEN. 

iards  subdued  the  Indians  under  plea  of  converting  them 
to  Christianity ;  hanging  thirteen  refractory  ones  in  hon 
our  of  Jesus  Christ  and  his  apostles:  and  we  English 
justify  our  colonial  aggressions  by  saying  that  the  Crea 
tor  intends  the  Anglo-Saxon  race  to  people  the  world ! 
An  insatiate  lust  of  conquest  transmutes  manslaying  into 
a  virtue  ;  and,  amongst  more  races  thaa  one,  implacable 
revenge  has  made  assassination  a  duty.  A  clever  theft 
was  praiseworthy  amongst  the  Spartans ;  and  it  is  equally 
so  amongst  Christians,  provided  it  be  on  a  sufficiently 
large  scale.  Piracy  was  heroism  with  Jason  and  his 
followers ;  was  so  also  with  the  Norsemen ;  is  so  still 
with  the  Malays ;  and  there  is  never  wanting  some  golden 
fleece  for  a  pretext.  Amongst  money-hunting  people  a 
man  is  commended  in  proportion  to  the  number  of  hours 
he  spends  in  business ;  in  our  day  the  rage  for  accumula 
tion  has  apotheosized  work ;  and  even  the  miser  is  not 
without  a  code  of  morals  by  which  to  defend  his  parsi 
mony.  The  ruling  classes  argue  themselves  into  the 
belief  that  property  should  be  represented  rather  than 
person — that  the  landed  interest  should  preponderate. 
The  pauper  is  thoroughly  persuaded  that  he  has  a  right  to 
relief.  The  monks  held  printing  to  be  an  invention  of  the 
devil;  and  some  of  our  modern  sectaries  regard  their 
refractory  brethren  as  under  demoniacal  possession.*  To 
the  clergy  nothing  is  more  obvious  than  that  a  state- 
church  is  just,  and  essential  to  the  maintenance  of  religion. 
The  sinecurist  thinks  himself  rightly  indignant  at  any 
disregard  of  his  vested  interests.  And  so  on  throughout 
society. 

Perhaps  the  slaveowner's  assertion  that  negroes  are 
not  human  beings,  and  the  kindred  dogma  of  the  Mahomet 
ans,  that  women  have  no  souls,f  are  the  strangest  sam- 

*  Speech  of  Mr.  Garland,  one  of  the  Conference  Methodists. 

f  Though  Washington  Irving  has  pointed  out  that  the  Koran  does  not 


ABSURD    OPINIONS     HEARTILY     ENTERTAINED.         179 

pies  of  convictions  so  formed.  In  these,  as  in  the  forego 
ing  cases,  selfishness  finds  out  a  satisfactory  reason  why  it 
may  do  what  it  wills — collects  and  distorts,  exaggerates 
and  suppresses,  so  as  ultimately  to  cheat  itself  into  the 
desired  conclusion.  Does  any  one  doubt  that  men  can 
really  believe  things  thus  palpably  opposed  to  the  plainest 
facts  ?  Does  any  one  assert  that  those  who  profess  opin 
ions  so  manifestly  absurd  must  be  hypocrites  ?  Let  him 
beware.  Let  him  consider  whether  selfishness  has  not 
deluded  him  into  absurdities  almost  as  gross.  The  laws 
of  England,  and  the  public  opinion  of  England,  counte 
nance  doctrines  nearly  as  preposterous  as  these  that  look  to 
us  inconceivable ;  nay,  the  very  same  doctrines  somewhat 
softened  down.  For  what,  when  closely  examined,  is 
this  notion  that  the  rights  of  women  are  not  equal  with 
those  of  men?  Simply  an  evanescent  form  of  the  theory 
that  women  have  no  souls. 

§  4.  ^.That  a  people's  condition  may  be  judged  by 
the  treatment  which  women  receive  under  it,  is  a  remark 
that  has  become  almost  trite.  The  facts,  of  which  this 
remark  is  a  generalization,  are  abundant  enough.  Look 
where  we  will,  we  find  that  just  as  far  as  the  law  of  the 
strongest  regulates  the  relationships  between  man  and 
man,  does  it  regulate  the  relationships  between  man  and 
woman.  To  the  same  extent  that  the  triumph  of  might 
over  right  is  seen  in  a  nation's  political  institutions,  it  is 
seen  in  its  domestic  ones.  Despotism  in  the  state  is 
necessarily  associated  with  despotism  in  the  family.  The 
two  being  alike  moral  in  their  origin,  cannot  fail  to  co 
exist.  Turkey,  Egypt,  India,  China,  Russia,  the  feudal 
states  of  Europe — it  needs  but  to  name  these  to  suggest 
hosts  of  facts  illustrative  of  such  an  accordance.  ' 

teach  this,  he  has  not  shown  that  Mahomet's  followers  do  not  hold  it. 
Most  likely  the  Mahometan  faith  has  undergone  corruptions  similar  to  those 
Buffered  by  Christianity. 


180  THE   EIGHTS    OF   WOMEN. 

Yet,  strangely  enough,  almost  all  of  us  who  let  fall 
this  observation,  overlook  its  application  to  ourselves. 
Here  we  sit  over  our  tea-tables,  and  pass  criticisms  upon 
national  character,  or  philosophize  upon  the  development 
of  civilized  institutions,  quietly  taking  it  for  granted  that 
we  are  civilized — that  the  state  of  things  we  live  under  is 
the  right  one,  or  thereabouts.  Although  the  people  of 
every  past  age  have  thought  the  like  and  have  been 
uniformly  mistaken,  there  are  still  many  to  whom  it  never 
occurs  that  we  may  be  mistaken  too.  Amidst  their  stric 
tures  upon  the  ill-treatment  of  women  in  the  East,  and  the 
unhealthy  social  arrangements  implied  by  it,  most  persons 
do  not  see  that  the  same  connection  between  political  and 
domestic  oppression  exists  in  this  England  of  ours  at  the 
present  hour,  and  that  in  as  far  as  our  laws  and  customs 
violate  the  rights  of  humanity  by  giving  the  richer  classes 
power  over  the  poorer,  in  so  far  do  they  similarly  violate 
those  rights  by  giving  the  stronger  sex  power  over  the 
weaker.  Yet,  looking  at  the  matter  apart  from  prejudice, 
and  considering  all  institutions  to  be,  as  they  are,  products 
of  the  popular  character,  we  cannot  avoid  confessing  that 
such  must  be  the  case.  To  the  same  extent  that  the  old 
leaven  of  tyranny  shows  itself  in  the  transactions  of  the 
senate,  it  will  creep  out  in  the  doings  of  the  household. 
If  injustice  sways  men's  public  acts,  it  will  inevitably 
sway  their  private  ones  also.  The  mere  fact,  therefore, 
that  oppression  marks  the  relationships  of  out-door  life, 
is  ample  proof  that  it  exists  in  the  relationships  of  the 
fireside. 

§  5.  The  desire  to  command  is  essentially  a  barbar 
ous  desire.  "Whether  seen  in  the  ukase  of  a  Czar,  or  in 
the  order  of  an  Eton  bully  to  his  fag,  it  is  alike  signifi 
cant  of  brutality.  Command  cannot  be  otherwise  than 
savage,  for  it  implies  an  appeal  to  force,  should  force  be 


BARBARISM   OF   THE   DESIEE   TO   COMMAND.  181 

needful.  Behind  its  "  You  shall,"  there  lies  the  scarcely 
hidden,  "  If  you  won't,  I'll  make  you."  Command  is  the 
growl  of  coercion  crouching  in  ambush.  Or  we  might 
aptly  term  it — violence  in  a  latent  state.  All  its  accesso 
ries — its  frown,  its  voice,  its  gestures,  prove  it  akin  to  the 
ferocity  of  the  uncivilized  man.  Command  is  the  foe  of 
peace,  for  it  breeds  war  of  words  and  feelings — sometimes 
of  deeds.  It  is  inconsistent  with  the  first  law  of  morality. 
It  is  radically  wrong. 

All  the  barbarisms  of  the  past  have  their  types  in  the 
present.  All  the  barbarisms  of  the  past  grew  out  of  cer 
tain  dispositions :  those  dispositions  may  be  weakened, 
but  they  are  not  extinct ;  and  so  long  as  they  exist  there 
must  be  manifestations  of  them.  What  we  commonly 
understand  by  command  and  obedience,  are  the  modern 
forms  of  bygone  despotism  and  slavery.  Philosophically 
considered,  they  are  identical  with  these.  Despotism  may 
be  defined  as  the  making  of  another's  will  bend  to  the  ful 
filment  of  our  own :  and  its  counterpart — slavery  as  the 
having  our  own  will  subordinated  to  the  will  of  another. 
True,  we  apply  the  terms  only  when  the  rule  of  one  will 
over  another  is  extreme — when  the  one  wholly,  or  almost 
wholly  extinguishes  the  other.  But  if  the  subjection  of 
man  to  man  is  bad  when  carried  to  its  full  extent,  it  is 
bad  in  any  degree.  If  every  man  has  freedom  to  exercise 
his  faculties  within  specified  limits ;  and  if,  as  we  have 
seen  (Chap.  VIII.),  slavery  is  wrong  because  it  trans 
gresses  that  freedom,  and  makes  one  man  use  his  powers, 
to  satisfy  not  his  own  wants,  but  the  wants  of  another ; 
then,  whatsoever  involves  command,  or  whatsoever  im 
plies  obedience,  is  wrong  also  ;  seeing  that  it,  too,  necessi 
tates  the  subserviency  of  one  man's  actions  to  the  gratifica 
tions  of  another.  "  You  must  not  do  as  you  will,  but  as  I 
will,"  is  the  basis  of  every  mandate,  whether  used  by  a 
planter  to  his  negro,  or  by  a  husband  to  his  wife.  Not 


182  THE   EIGHTS   OF   WOMEN. 

satisfied  with  being  sole  ruler  over  his  own  doings,  the 
petty  autocrat  oversteps  the  boundary  dividing  his  sphere 
of  action  from  his  neighbour's,  and  takes  upon  himself  to 
direct  his  or  her  doings  also.  It  matters  not,  in  point  of 
principle,  whether  such  domination  is  entire  or  partial. 
To  whatever  extent  the  will  of  the  one  is  overborne  by  the 
will  of  the  other,  to  that  extent  the  parties  are  tyrant  and 
slave. 

There  are,  without  doubt,  many  who  will  rebel  against 
this  doctrine.  There  are  many  who  hold  that  the  obedi 
ence  of  one  human  being  to  another  is  proper,  virtuous, 
praiseworthy.  There  are  many  to  whose  moral  sense 
command  is  not  repugnant.  There  are  many  who  think 
the  subjection  of  the  weaker  sex  to  the  stronger  legitimate 
and  beneficial.  Let  them  not  be  deceived.  Let  them 
remember  that  a  nation's  institutions  and  beliefs  are 
determined  by  its  character.  Let  them  remember  that 
men's  perceptions  are  warped  by  their  passions.  Let 
them  remember  that  our  social  state  proves  our  superior 
feelings  to  be  very  imperfectly  developed.  And  let  them 
remember  that,  as  many  customs  deemed  right  by  our 
ancestors,  appear  detestable  to  us,  so,  many  customs 
which  we  think  proper,  our  more  civilized  descendants 
may  regard  with  aversion — even  as  we  loathe  those  bar 
barian  manners  which  forbid  a  woman  to  sit  at  table  with 
her  lord  and  master,  so  may  mankind  one  day  loathe  that 
subserviency  of  wife  to  husband,  which  existing  laws 
enjoin. 

As  elsewhere  shown  (page  41),  moral  sense  becomes  a 
trustworthy  guide  only  when  it  has  logic  for  an  interpre 
ter.  Nothing  but  its  primary  institution  is  authoritative. 
From  the  fundamental  law  to  which  it  gives  utterance, 
reason  has  to  deduce  the  consequences ;  and  from  these, 
when  correctly  drawn,  there  is  no  appeal.  It  proves  noth 
ing,  therefore,  that  there  are  some  who  do  not  feel  com- 


ARBITRARY   RULE    ESSENTIALLY   BRUTAL.  183 

mand  to  be  improper.  It  is  for  such  to  inquire  whether 
command  is  or  is  not  consistent  with  that  first  principle 
expressive  of  the  Divine  will — that  axiom  to  which  the 
Moral  Sense  responds.  And  they  will  find  that,  thus 
judged  by  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  command  is  at  once 
pronounced  wrong;  for  whoso  commands,  manifestly 
claims  more  freedom  than  whoso  is  commanded. 

§  6.  A  future  belief  that  subordination  of  sex  is 
inequitable,  is  clearly  prophesied  by  the  change  civiliza 
tion  is  working  in  men's  sentiments.  The  arbitrary  rule 
of  one  human  being  over  another,  no  matter  in  what  form 
it  may  appear,  is  fast  getting  recognized  as  essentially 
rude  and  brutal.  In  our  day,  the  man  of  refined  feeling 
does  not  like  to  play  the  despot  over  his  fellow.  He  is 
disgusted  if  one  in  humble  circumstances  cringes  to  him. 
So  far  from  wishing  to  elevate  himself  by  depressing  his 
poor  and  ignorant  neighbours,  he  strives  to  put  them  at 
their  ease  in  his  presence — encourages  them  to  behave 
in  a  less  submissive  and  more  self-respecting  manner.  He 
feels  that  a  fellow-man  may  be  enslaved  by  imperious 
words  and  manners  as  well  as  by  tyrannical  deeds ;  and 
hence  he  avoids  a  dictatorial  style  of  speech  to  those  be 
low  him.  Even  paid  domestics,  to  whose  services  he  has 
obtained  a  right  by  contract,  he  does  not  like  to  address 
in  a  tone  of  authority.  He  seeks  rather  to  disguise  his 
character  of  master:  to  this  end  wraps  up  his  com 
mands  in  the  shape  of  requests ;  and  continually  em 
ploys  the  phrases,  "  If  you  please,"  and  "  Thank  you." 

In  the  conduct  of  the  modern  gentleman  to  his  friend, 
we  have  additional  signs  of  this  growing  respect  for 
another's  dignity.  Every  one  must  have  observed  the 
carefulness  with  which  those  who  are  on  terms  of  affec 
tionate  intimacy,  shun  any  thing  in  the  form  of  supremacy 
on  either  side,  or  endeavour  to  banish  from  remembrance, 


184  THE   EIGHTS   OF   WOMEN. 

by  their  behaviour  to  each  other,  whatever  of  supremacy 
there  may  exist.  Who  is  there  that  has  not  witnessed  the 
dilemma  in  which  the  wealthier  of  two  such  is  sometimes 
placed,  between  the  wish  to  confer  a  benefit  on  the  other, 
and  the  fear  that  in  so  doing  he  may  offend  by  assuming 
the  attitude  of  a  patron  ?  And  who  is  there  that  does  not 
feel  how  destructive  it  would  be  of  the  sentiment  subsist 
ing  between  himself  and  his  friend,  were  he  to  play  the 
master  over  his  friend,  or  his  friend  to  play  the  master 
over  him  ? 

A  further  increase  of  this  same  refinement  will  show 
men  that  there  is  a  fatal  incongruity  between  the  matri 
monial  servitude  which  our  law  recognizes,  and  the  rela 
tionship  that  ought  to  exist  between  husband  and  wife. 
Surely  if  he  who  possesses  any  generosity  of  nature  dis 
likes  speaking  to  a  hired  domestic  in  a  tone  of  authority 
— if  he  cannot  bear  assuming  toward  his  friend  the 
behaviour  of  a  superior — how  utterly  repugnant  to  him 
should  it  be,  to  make  himself  ruler  over  one  on  whose 
behalf  all  his  kindly  sentiments  are  specially  enlisted ;  one 
to  whom  he  is  bound  by  the  strongest  attachment  that  his 
nature  is  capable  of;  and  for  whose  rights  and  dignity  he 
ought  to  have  the  most  active  sympathy ! 

§  7.  Command  is  a  blight  to  the  affections.  What 
soever  of  refinement — whatsoever  of  beauty — whatsoever 
of  poetry,  there  is  in  the  passion  that  unites  the  sexes, 
withers  up  and  dies  in  the  cold  atmosphere  of  authority. 
Native  as  they  are  to  such  widely-separated  regions  of  our 
nature,  Love  and  Coercion  cannot  possibly  nourish  to 
gether.  The  one  grows  out  of  our  best  feelings:  the  other 
has  its  root  in  our  worst.  Love  is  sympathetic  :  Coercion 
is  callous.  Love  is  gentle:  Coercion  is  harsh.  Love  is 
self-sacrificing :  Coercion  is  selfish.  How  then  can  they 
coexist?  It  is  the  property  of  the  first  to  attract;  whilst 


COMMAND   EXTINGUISHES   AFFECTION.  185 

it  is  that  of  the  last  to  repel :  and,  conflicting  as  they  thus 
do,  it  is  the  constant  tendency  of  each  to  destroy  the 
other.  Let  whoever  thinks  the  two  compatible  imagine 
himself  acting  the  master  over  his  betrothed.  Does  he 
believe  that  he  could  do  this  without  any  injury  to  the 
subsisting" relationship  ?  Does  he  not  know  rather  that  a 
bad  effect  would  be  produced  upon  the  feelings  of  both 
parties  by  the  assumption  of  such  an  attitude  ?  And  con 
fessing  this,  as  he  must,  is  he  superstitious  enough  to 
suppose  that  the  going  through  a  form  of  words  will  ren 
der  harmless  that  use  of  command  which  was  previously 
hurtful  ? 

Of  all  the  causes  which  conspire  to  produce  the  disap 
pointment  of  those  glowing  hopes  with  which  married  life 
is  usually  entered  upon,  none  is  so  potent  as  this  suprem 
acy  of  sex — this  degradation  of  what  should  be  a  free 
and  equal  relationship  into  one  of  ruler  and  subject — this 
supplanting  of  the  sway  of  affection  by  the  sway  of 
authority.  Only  as  that  condition  of  slavery  to  which 
women  are  condemned  amongst  barbarous  nations  is 
ameliorated,  does  ideal  love  become  possible ;  and  only 
when  that  condition  of  slavery  shall  have  been  wholly 
abolished,  will  ideal  love  attain  fulness  and  permanence. 
The  facts  around  us  plainly  indicate  this.  Wherever  any 
thing  worth  calling  connubial  happiness  at  present  exists, 
we  shall  find  that  the  subjugation  of  wife  to  husband  is 
not  enforced;  though  perhaps  still  held  in  theory,  it  is 
practically  repudiated. 

§  8.  There  are  many  who  think  that  authority,  and 
its  ally  compulsion,  are  the  sole  agencies  by  which  human 
beings  can  be  controlled.  -Anarchy  or  government  are, 
with  them,  the  only  conceivable  alternatives.  Believing 
in  nothing  but  what  they  see,  they  cannot  realize  the 
possibility  of  a  condition  of  things  in  which  peace  and 


186  THE  EIGHTS   OF  WOMEN. 

order  shall  be  maintained  without  force,  or  the  fear  of 
force.  By  such  as  these,  the  doctrine  that  the  reign  of 
man  over  woman  is  wrong,  will  no  doubt  be  combated  on 
the  ground  that  the  domestic  relationship  can  only  exist 
by  tne  help  of  such  supremacy.  The  impracticability  of 
an  equality  of  rights  between  the  sexes  will  be  urged 
by  them  in  disproof  of  its  rectitude.  It  will  be  argued, 
that  were  they  put  upon  a  level  husband  and  wife  would 
be  forever  in  antagonism — that  as,  when  their  wishes 
clashed,  each  would  possess  a  like  claim  to  have  his  or 
her  way,  the  matrimonial  bond  would  daily  be  endangered 
by  the  jar  of  opposing  wills,  and  that,  involving  as  it 
would  a  perpetual  conflict,  such  an  arrangement  of  married 
life  must  necessarily  be  an  erroneous  one. 

A  very  superficial  conclusion  this.  It  has  been  already 
pointed  out  (p.  50)  that  there  must  be  an  inconsistency 
between  the  perfect  law  and  an  imperfect  state.  The 
worse  the  condition  of  society,  the  more  visionary  must  a 
true  code  of  morality  appear.  The  fact  that  any  proposed 
principle  of  conduct  is  at  once  fully  practicable — requires 
no  reformation  of  human  nature  for  its  complete  realiza 
tion — is  not  a  proof  of  its  truth :  is  proof  rather  of  its  error. 
And,  conversely,  a  certain  degree  of  incongruity  between 
such  a  principle  and  humanity  as  we  know  it,  though 
no  proof  of  the  correctness  of  that  principle,  is  at  any  rate 
a  fact  in  its  favour.  Hence  the  allegation  that  mankind 
are  not  good  enough  to  admit  of  the  sexes  living  together 
harmoniously  under  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  in  no  way 
militates  against  the  validity  or  sacredness  of  that  law. 

But  the  never-ceasing  process  of  adaptation  will  grad 
ually  remove  this  obstacle  to  domestic  rectitude.  Recog 
nition  of  the  moral  law,  and  an  impulse  to  act  up  to  it, 
going  hand  in  hand,  as  we  have  seen  that  they  must  do 
(p.  38),  equality  of  rights  in  the  married  state  will  become 
possible  as  fast  as  there  arises  a  perception  of  its  justness. 


UBfi 

GRADUAL   AMELIORATIONS   OF    SOCIE^f.  187 

DJffJ7ERS 

That  selfish  conflict  of  claims  which,  according  to  the 
foregoing  objection,  would  reduce  a  union,  founded  on  the 
law  of  equal  freedom,  to  a  condition  of  anarchy,  presup 
poses  a  deficiency  in  those  feelings  with  which  a  belief  in 
the  law  of  equal  freedom  originates,  and  would  decrease 
with  the  growth  of  those  feelings.  As  elsewhere  shown 
(p.  115),  the  same  sentiment  which  leads  us  to  maintain 
our  own  rights,  leads  us,  by  its  sympathetic  excitement, 
to  respect  the  rights  of  our  neighbours.  Other  things 
equal,  the  sense  of  justice  to  ourselves,  and  the  sense  of 
justice  to  our  fellow-creatures,  bear  a  constant  ratio  to 
each  other.  A  state  in  which  every  one  is  jealous  of  his 
natural  claims,  is  not  therefore  a  litigious  state,  because  it 
is  one  in  which  there  is  of  necessity  a  diminished  tendency 
to  aggression/  Experience  proves  this.  For,  as  it  cannot 
be  denied  that  there  is  now  a  greater  disposition  amongst 
men  toward  the  assertion  of  individual  liberty  than  ex 
isted  during  the  feudal  ages,  so  neither  can  it  be  denied 
that  there  is  now  a  less  disposition  amongst  men  to  tres 
pass  against  each  other  than  was  then  exhibited.  The 

two  changes  are  coordinate,  and  must  continue  to  be  so. 

r? 
Hence,   whenever   society-- shall    have    become    civilized 

enough  to  recognize  the  equality  of  rights  between  the 
sexes— ^when  women  shall  have  attained  to  a  clear  percep 
tion  of  what  is  due  to  them,  and  men  to  a  nobility  of  feel 
ing  which  shall  make  them  concede  to  women  the  freedom 
which  they  themselves  claim — humanity  will  have  under 
gone  such  a  modification  as  to  render  an  equality  of  rights 
practicable. 

Married  life  under  this  ultimate  state  of  things  will 
not  be  characterized  by  perpetual  squabbles,  but  by  mu 
tual  concessions.  Instead  of  a  desire  on  tfre  part  of  the 
husband  to  assert  his  claims  to  the  uttermost,  regardless 
of  those  of  his  wife,  or  on  the  part  of  the  wife  to  do  the 
like,  there  will  be  a  watchful  desire  on  both  sides  not  to 


188  THE  EIGHTS   OF   WOMEN. 

transgress.  Neither  will  have  to  stand  on  the  defensive, 
because  each  will  be  solicitous  for  the  rights  of  the  other. 
Not  encroachment,  but  self-sacrifice,  will  be  the  ruling 
principle.  The  struggle  will  not  be  which  shall  gain  the 
mastery,  but  which  shall  give  way.  Committing  a  tres 
pass  will  be  the  thing  feared,  and  not  the  being  trespassed 
against. "  And  thus,  instead  of  domestic  discord,  will  come 
a  higher  harmony  than  any  we  yet  know. 

There  is  nothing  Utopian  in  this.  We  may  already 
trace  the  beginnings  of  it.  An  attitude  like  that  described 
is  not  uncommonly  maintained  in  the  dealings  of  honour 
able  men  with  each  other ;  and  if  so,  why  should  it  not 
exist  between  the  sexes  ?  Here  and  there,  indeed,  may 
be  found,  even  now,  a  wedded  pair,  who  preserve  such  a 
relationship.  And  what  is  at  present  the  exception  may 
one  day  be  the  rule. 

§  9.  The  extension  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom  to 
both  sexes  will  doubtless  be  objected  to,  on  the  ground 
that  the  political  privileges  exercised  by  men  muat  thereby 
be  ceded  to  women  also.  -<pf  course  they  must ;'  and  why 
not  ?  Is  it  that  women  are  ignorant  of  state  affairs  ? 
Why  then  their  opinions  would  be  those  of  their  husbands 
and  brothers ;  and  the  practical  effect  would  be  merely 
that  of  giving  each  male  elector  two  votes  instead  of  one. 
Is  it  that  they/might  by-and-by  become  better  informed, 
and  might  then  begin  to  act  independently  ?y  Why,  in 
such  case,  they  would  be  pretty  much  as  competent  to  use 
their  power  with  intelligence  as  the  members  of  our  pres 
ent  constituencies. 

We  are  told,  however,  that^"  woman's  mission "  is  a 
domestic  one — that  her  character  and  position  do  not 
admit  of  her  taking  a  part  in  the  decision  of  public  ques 
tions — that  politics  are  beyond  her  sphere.  But  this 
raises  the  question— Who  shall  say  what  her  sphere  is  ? 


THE    SPHEEE    OF   WOMEN.  180 

.Amongst  the  Pawnees  and  Sioux  it  is  that  of  a  beast  of 
burden ;  she  has  to  carry  the  baggage,  to  drag  home  fuel 
from  the  woods,  and  to  do  every  thing  that  is  menial  and 
laborious.  *  .  In  slave-countries  it  is  within  woman's  sphere 
to  work  side  by  side  with  men,  under  the  lash  of  the  task 
master.  Clerkships,  cashierships,  and  other  responsible 
business  situations,  are  comprised  in  her  sphere  in  modern 
France.  Whilst,  on  the  other  hand,  the  sphere  of  a  Turk 
ish  or  Egyptian  lady  extends  scarcely  an  inch  beyond  the 
walls  of  the  harem?  Who  now  will  tell  us  what  woman's 
sphere  really  is  ?  As  the  usages  of  mankind  vary  so  much, 
let  us  hear  how  it  is  to  be  shown  that  the  sphere  we  assign 
her  is  the  true  one — that  the  limits  we  have  set  to  female 
activity  are  just  the  proper  limits.  Let  us  hear  why  on 
this  one  point  of  our  social  polity  we  are  exactly  right, 
whilst  we  are  wrong  on  so  many  others. 

It  is  indeed  said,  thakCthe  exercise  of  political  power 
by  women  is  repugnant  to  our  sense  of  propriety — con 
flicts  with  our  ideas  of  the  feminine  character — is  alto 
gether  condemned  by  our  feelings.  Granted ;  but  what 
then  ?  The  same  plea  has  been  urged  in  defence  of  a 
thousand  absurdities,  and  if  valid  in  one  case  is  equally 
so  in  all  others.  Should  a  traveller  in  the  East  inquire  of 
a  Turk  why  women  in  his  country  conceal  their  faces,  he 
would  be  told  that  for  them  to  go  unveiled  would  be  con 
sidered  indecent ;  would  offend  the  feelings  of  the  specta 
tors.  In  Russia  female  voices  are  never  heard  in  church  : 
women  not  being  thought  worthy  "  to  sing  the  praises  of 
God  in  the  presence  of  men ; "  and  the  disregard  of  this 
regulation  would  be  censured  as  an  outrage  upon  public 
feeling.  There  was  a  time  in  France  when  men  were  so 
enamoured  of  ignorance,  that  a  lady  who  pronounced  any 
but  the  commonest  words  correctly,  was  blushed  for  by 
her  companions ;  a  tolerable  proof  that  people's  feelings 
then  blamed  in  a  woman  that  literateness  which  it  is  now 


190  THE   EIGHTS    OF   WOMEN. 

thought  a  disgrace  for  her  to  be  without.  /Jn  China 
cramped  feet  are  essential  to  female  refinement ;  and  so 
strong  is  the  feeling  in  this  matter,  that  a  Chinese  will 
not  believe  that  an  Englishwoman  who  walks  naturally, 
can  be  one  of  a  superior  class.  It  was  once  held  unfemi- 
nine  for  a  lady  to  write  a  book ;  and  no  doubt  those  who 
thought  it  so,  would  have  quoted  feelings  in  support  of 
their  opinion.  Yet,  with  facts  like  these  on  every  hand, 
people  assume  that  the  enfranchisement  of  women  can 
not  be  right,  because  it  is  repugnant  to  their  feelings ! 

We  have  some  feelings  that  are  necessary  and  eternal ; 
we  have  others  that,  being  the  results  of  custom,  are 
changeable  and  evanescent.  And  there  is  no  way  of  dis 
tinguishing  those  feelings  which  are  natural  from  those 
which  are  conventional,  except  by  an  appeal  to  first  prin 
ciples.  If  a  sentiment  responds  to  some  necessity  of  our 
condition,  its  dictates  must  be  respected.  If  otherwise — 
if  opposed  to  a  necessity,  instead  of  in  harmony  with  one, 
we  must  regard  that  sentiment  as  the  product  of  circum 
stances,  of  education,  of  habit,  and  consequently  without 
•  weight.  However  much,  therefore,  the  giving  of  political 
power  to  women  may  disagree  with  our  notions  of  pro 
priety,  we  must  conclude  that,  being  required  by  that  first 
prerequisite  to  greatest  happiness — the  law  of  equal 
freedom — such  a  concession  is  unquestionably  right  and 
good. 

§  10.  Thus  it  has  been  shown\that  .the  rights  of 
women  must  stand  or  fall  with  those  of  men ;  derived  as 
they  are  from  the  same  authority ;  involved  in  the  same 
axiom ;  demonstrated  by  the  same  argument.  That  'the 
law  of  equal  freedom  applies  alike  to  both  sexes,  has  been 
further  proved  by  the  fact  that  any  other  hypothesis  in 
volves  us  in  inextricable  difficulties.  The  idea  that  the 
rights  of  women  are  not  equal  to  those  of  men,  has  been 


MUST   STAND   OE   FALL    WITH   THOSE   OF   MEN.          191 

condemned  as  akin  to  the  Eastern  dogma,  that  women 
have  no  souls.  It  has  been  argued  that  the  position  at 
present  held  by  the  weaker  sex  is  of  necessity  a  wrong 
one,  seeing  that  the  same  selfishness  which  vitiates  our 
political  institutions,  must  inevitably  vitiate  our  domestic 
ones  also.  Subordination  of  females  to  males  has  been 
also  repudiated,  because  it  implies  the  use  of  command, 
and  thereby  reveals  its  descent  from  barbarism.  Proof 
has  been  given  that  the  attitudes  of  mastery  on  the  one 
side,  and  submission  on  the  other,  are  essentially  at  va 
riance  with  that  refined  sentiment  which  should  subsist 
between  husband  and  wife.  The  argument  that  married 
life  would  be  impracticable  under  any  other  arrangement, 
has  been  met  by  pointing  out  how  the  relationship  of 
equality  must  become  possible  as  fast  as  its  justness  is  rec 
ognized.  And  lastly,  it  has  been  shown  that  the  objec 
tions  commonly  raised  against  giving  political  power  to 
women,  are  founded  on  notions  and  prejudices  that  will 
not  bear  examination. 


CHAPTER    XVII. 

THE   EIGHTS    OF   CIIILDEEN. 

§  1.  If  we  are  once  sure  of  our  law — sure  that  it  is 
a  Divine  ordination — sure  that  it  is  rooted  in  the  nature 
of  things,  then  whithersoever  it  leads  we  may  safely  fol 
low.  As  elsewhere  pointed  out  (Lemma  IL),  a  true  rule 
has  no  exceptions.  When  therefore  that  first  principle 
from  which  the  rights  of  adults  are  derived,  turns  out  to 
be  a  source  from  which  we  may  derive  the  rights  of  chil 
dren,  and  when  the  two  processes  of  deduction  prove  to 
be  identical,  we  have  no  choice  but  to  abide  by  the  result, 


192  THE   EIGHTS    OF    CHILDREN. 

and  to  assume  that  the  one  inference  is  equally  authorita 
tive  with  the  other. 

That  the  law — Every  man  has  freedom  to  do  all  that 
he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of 
any  other  man — applies  as  much  to  the  young  as  to  the 
mature,  becomes  manifest  on  referring  back  to  its  origin. 
God  wills  human  happiness ;  that  happiness  is  attainable 
only  through  the  medium  of  faculties ;  for  the  production 
of  happiness  those  faculties  must  be  exercised ;  the  exer 
cise  of  them  presupposes  liberty  of  action ;  these  are  the 
steps  by  which  we  find  our  way  from  the  Divine  will  to 
the  law  of  equal  freedom.  But  the  demonstration  is  fully 
as  complete  when  used  on  behalf  of  the  child,  as  when 
used  on  behalf  of  the  man.  The  child's  happiness,  too,  is 
willed  by  the  Deity ;  the  child,  too,  has  faculties  to  be  ex 
ercised  ;  the  child,  too,  needs  scope  for  the  exercise  of 
those  faculties ;  the  child  therefore  has  claims  to  freedom — 
rights  as  we  call  them — coextensive  with  those  of  the 
adult.  We  cannot  avoid  this  conclusion,  if  we  would. 
Either  we  must  reject  the  law  altogether,  or  we  must  in 
clude  under  it  both  sexes  and  all  ages. 

The  candid  thinker  will  find  himself  obliged  to  con 
cede  this,  when  he  considers  the  many  perplexities  which 
follow  in  the  train  of  any  other  theory.  For,  if  it  be  as 
serted  that  the  law  of  equal  freedom  applies  only  to 
adults ;  that  is,  if  it  be  asserted  that  men  have  rights,  but 
that  children  have  none,  we  are  immediately  met  by  the 
question — When  does  the  child  become  a  man  ?  at  what 
period  does  the  human  being  pass  out  of  the  condition  of 
having  no  rights,  into  the  condition  of  having  rights  ? 
None  will  have  the  folly  to  quote  the  arbitrary  dictum  of 
the  statute-book  as  an  answer.  The  appeal  is  to  an  au 
thority  above  that  of  legislative  enactments — demands  on 
what  these  are  to  be  founded — on  what  attribute  of  man 
hood  recognition  by  the  law  of  equal  freedom  depends. 


THE   TESTS    OF   MANHOOD.  193 

Shall  the  youth  be  entitled  to  the  rights  of  humanity 
when  the  pitch  of  his  voice  sinks  an  octave  ?  or  when  he 
begins  to  shave  ?  or  when  he  ceases  growing  ?  or  when  he 
can  lift  a  hundred  weight  ?  Are  we  to  adopt  the  test  of 
age,  of  stature,  of  weight,  of  strength,  of  virility,  or  of  intel 
ligence  ?  Much  may  no  doubt  be  said  in  favour  of  each  of 
these ;  but  who  can  select  the  true  one  ?  And  who  can 
answer  the  objection,  tH&t  whichever  qualification  is  chos 
en,  will  class  many  as  men  who  are  not  at  present  consid 
ered  such ;  whilst  it  will  reject  from  the  list,  others  who 
are  now  by  universal  consent  included  in  it  ? 

Nor  is  this  all.  For  even  supposing  that,  by  some  un 
discovered  species  of  logic,  it  has  been  determined  on 
what  particular  day  of  his  life  the  human  being  may  equit 
ably  claim  his  freedom,  it  still  remains  to  define  the  posi 
tion  he  holds  previously  to  this  period.  Has  the  minor 
absolutely  no  rights  at  all  ?  If  so,  there  is  nothing  wrong 
in  infanticide.  If  so,  f  obbery  is  justifiable,  provided  the 
party  robbed  be  under  age.  If  so,  a  child  may  equitably 
be  enslaved.  For,  as  already  shown  (pp.  130,  153),  mur 
der,  theft,  and  the  holding  of  others  in  bondage  are  wrong, 
simply  because  they  are  violations  of  human  rights  ;  and 
if  children  have  no  rights,  they  cannot  become  the  subjects 
of  these  crimes.  But  if,  on  the  other  hand,  it  be  held,  as 
it  is  held,  that  children  have  some  rights ;  if  it  be  held 
that  the  youth  has  an  equal  claim  to  life  with  the  adult ; 
if  it  be  held  that  he  has  something  like  the  same  title  to 
liberty ;  and  if  it  be  held  (though  not  by  law,  yet  by  public 
opinion)  that  he  is  similarly  capable  of  owning  property, 
then  it  becomes  needful  to  show  why  these  primary  rights 
must  be  conceded,  but  no  others.  They  who  assert  that 
children  are  wholly  without  rights,  and  that,  like  the  in 
ferior  animals,  they  exist  only  by  permission  of  grown 
men,  take  up  a  precise,  unmistakable  position.  But  they 
who  suppose  children  to  occupy  a  place  morally  above 
9 


194:  THE  EIGHTS   OF   CHILDREN. 

that  of  brutes,  and  yet  maintain  that  whilst  children  have 
certain  rights,  their  rights  are  not  equal  with  those  of 
men,  are  called  upon  to  draw  the  line,  to  explain,  to  de 
fine.  They  must  say  what  rights  are  common  to  children 
and  adults,  and  why.  They  must  say  where  the  rights 
of  adults  exceed  those  of  children,  and  why.  And  their 
answers  to  these  queries  must  be  drawn,  not  from  consid 
erations  of  expediency,  but  from'the  original  constitution 
of  things. 

Should  it  be  argued,  that  the  relationship  in  which  a 
parent  stands  to  his  child,  as  supplying  it  with  the  neces 
saries  of  life,  is  a  different  one  from  that  subsisting  be 
tween  man  and  man,  and  that  consequently  the  law  of 
equal  freedom  does  not  apply,  the  answer  is,  that  though 
by  so  maintaining  it  a  parent  establishes  a  certain  claim 
upon  his  child — a  claim  which  he  may  fairly  expect  to 
have  discharged  by  a  like  kindness  toward  himself  should 
he  ever  need  it,  yet  he  establishes  no  title  to  dominion. 
For  if  the  conferring  an  obligation  establishes  a  title  to 
dominion  in  this  case,  then  must  it  do  so  in  others ;  whence 
it  will  follow  that  if  one  man  becomes  a  benefactor  to 
another,  he  thereby  obtains  the  right  to  play  the  master 
over  that  other;  a  conclusion  which  we  do  not  admit. 
Moreover,  if  in  virtue  of  his  position  a  parent  may  trench 
upon  the  liberties  of  his  child,  there  necessarily  arises  the 
question — To  what  extent  may  he  do  this ;  may  he  destroy 
them  entirely,  as  by  committing  murder  ?  If  not,  it  is 
required  to  ascertain  the  limit  up  to  which  he  may  go,  but 
which  he  must  not  exceed ;  a  problem  equally  insoluble 
with  the  similar  one  just  noticed. 

Unless,  therefore,  the  reader  can  show  that  the  train 
of  reasoning  by  which  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  de 
duced  from  the  Divine  will,  does  not  recognize  children, 
which  he  cannot ;  unless  he  can  show  exactly  at  what 
time  the  child  becomes  a  man,  which  he  cannot ;  unless  he 


TO  THE   EXERCISE   OF  THEEB  FACULTIES.  195 

can  show  why  a  certain  share  of  liberty  naturally  attaches 
to  both  childhood  and  manhood,  and  another  share  to  only 
one,  which  he  cannot ;  he  must  admit  that  the  rights  of 
the  youth  and  the  adult  are  coextensive. 

There  is  indeed  one  plausible-looking  way  of  meeting 
these  arguments.  It  may  be  urged  that  in  the  child  many 
of  the  faculties  of  the  future  man  are  undeveloped,  and 
that  as  rights  are  primarily  dependent  on  faculties,  the 
rights  of  children  cannot  be  coextensive  with  those  of 
adults,  because  their  faculties  are  not  so.  A  fatal  objec 
tion  this,  did  it  touch  the  question ;  but  it  happens  to  be 
wholly  beside  it.  The  fullest  endowment  of  rights  that 
any  being  can  possess,  is  perfect  freedom  to  exercise  all  his 
faculties.  And  if  each  of  two  beings  possesses  perfect 
freedom  to  exercise  all  his  faculties,  each  possesses  com- 
plete  rights;  that  is,  the  rights  of  the  two  are  equal /  no 
matter  whether  their  faculties  are  equal  or  not.  For,  to 
say  that  the  rights  of  the  one  are  less  than  those  of  the 
other,  because  his  faculties  are  fewer,  is  to  say  that  he  has 
no  right  to  exercise  the  faculties  he  has  not  got ! — a  cu 
rious  compound  of  truism  and  absurdity. 

§  2.  Due  warning  was  given  (p.  65)  that  our  first 
principle  carried  in  it  the  germs  of  sundry  unlooked-for 
conclusions.  We  have  now  met  with  one  of  these.  We 
have  just  found  ourselves  committed  to  a  proposition  at 
war  with  the  convictions  of  almost  all.  Truth,  however, 
must  of  necessity  be  consistent.  We  have  therefore  no 
alternative  but  to  reexamine  our  preconceived  opinions, 
in  the  expectation  of  finding  them  erroneous. 

That  we  may  enter  upon  this  task  in  a  philosophical 
spirit,  it  will  be  well,  at  the  risk  even  of  something  like 
repetition,  to  glance  at  the  influences  by  which  our  beliefs 
are  in  danger  of  being  warped.  We  need  constantly  re 
minding  of  these.  As  an  abstract  truth,  we  all  admit  that 


196  THE   EIGHTS   OF   CIIILDEEN. 

passion  distorts  judgment ;  yet  never  inquire  whether 
our  passions  are  influencing  us.  We  all  decry  prejudice, 
yet  are  all  prejudiced.  We  see  how  habits,  and  interests, 
and  likings,  mould  the  theories  of  those  around  us ;  yet 
forget  that  our  own  theories  are  similarly  moulded.  Nev 
ertheless,  the  instances  in  which  our  feelings  bias  us  in 
spite  of  ourselves  are  of  hourly  recurrence.  That  pro 
prietary  passion  which  a  man  has  for  his  ideas,  veils  their 
defects  to  him  as  effectually  as  maternal  fondness  blinds  a 
mother  to  the  imperfections  of  her  offspring.  An  author 
cannot,  for  the  life  of  him,  judge  correctly  of  what  he  has 
just  written ;  he  has  to  wait  until  lapse  o'f  time  enables  him 
to  read  it  as  though  it  were  a  stranger's,  and  he  then  dis 
cerns  flaws  where  all  had  seemed  perfect.  It  is  only  when 
his  enthusiasm  on  its  behalf  has  grown  cold,  that  the  art 
ist  is  able  to  see  the  faults  of  his  picture.  Whilst  they 
are  transpiring,  we  do  not  perceive  the  ultimate  bearing 
of  our  own  acts  or  the  acts  of  others  toward  us ;  only  in 
after  years  are  we  able  to  philosophize  upon  them.  Just 
so,  too,  is  it  with  successive  generations.  Men  of  the  past 
quite  misunderstood  the  institutions  they  lived  under ; 
they  pertinaciously  adhered  to  the  most  vicious  principles, 
and  were  bitter  in  their  opposition  to  right  ones,  at  the 
dictates  of  their  attachments  and  antipathies.  So  difficult 
is  it  for  man  to  emancipate  himself  from  the  invisible  fet 
ters  which  habit  and  education  cast  over  his  intellect;  and 
so  palpable  is  the  consequent  incompetency  of  a  people  to 
judge  rightly  of  itself  and  its  deeds  or  opinions,  that  the 
fact  has  been  embodied  in  the  current  aphorism — "  No  age 
can  write  its  own  history ; "  an  aphorism  sufficiently  ex 
pressive  of  the  universality  of  prejudice. 

If  we  act  wisely,  we  shall  assume  that  the  reasonings 
of  modern  society  are  subject  to  the  like  disturbing  influ 
ences.  We  shall  conclude  that,  even  now,  as  in  times 
gone  by,  opinion  is  but  the  counterpart  of  condition — 


OPINION   THE   COUNTERPART   OF   CONDITION.  197 

merely  expresses  the  degree  of  civilization  to  which  we 
have  attained.  We  shall  suspect  that  many  of  those  con 
victions  which  seem  the  results  of  dispassionate  thinking, 
have  been  nurtured  in  us  by  circumstances.  We  shall 
confess  that  as,  heretofore,  fanatical  opposition  to  this 
doctrine,  and  bigoted  adhesion  to  that,  have  been  no  tests 
of  the  truth  or  falsity  of  the  said  doctrines  ;  so  neither  is 
the  strength  of  attachment,  or  dislike  which  a  nation  now 
exhibits  toward  certain  principles,  any  proof  of  their  cor 
rectness  or  their  fallacy.  Nay  more — we  shall  not  only 
admit  that  public  opinion  may  be  wrong,  but  that  it  must 
be  so.  Without  a  general  equilibrium  between  institutions 
and  ideas  society  cannot  subsist ;  and  hence,  if  error  per 
vades  our  institutions,  it  must  similarly  pervade  our  ideas. 
Just  as  much  as  a  people  falls  short  of  perfection  in  its 
state,  will  it  lack  of  truth  in  its  beliefs. 

Thus  much  by  way  of  bespeaking  a  calm  hearing.  As 
lately  said,  the  proposition  about  to  be  maintained  con 
flicts  with  the  habits,  associations,  and  most  cherished  con 
victions  of  the  great  majority.  That  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  applies  to  children  as  much  as  to  adults  ;  that 
consequently  the  rights  of  children  are  coextensive  with 
those  of  adults ;  that,  as  violating  those  rights,  the  use  of 
coercion  is  wrong ;  and  that  the  relationship  now  com 
monly  existing  between  parents  and  children  is  therefore 
a  vicious  one — these  are  assertions  which  perhaps  few  will 
listen  to  with  equanimity.  Nevertheless,  if  there  be  any 
weight  in  the  foregoing  considerations,  we  shall  do  well  to 
disregard  all  protests  of  feeling,  and  place  implicit  faith  in 
the  conclusions  of  abstract  equity. 

§  3.  We  say  that  a  man's  character  may  be  told  by 
the  company  he  keeps.  We  might  similarly  say  that  the 
truth  of  a  belief  may  be  judged  by  the  morality  with 
which  it  is  associated.  Given  a  theory  universally  current 


198  THE   EIGHTS   OF   CHILDREN. 

amongst  the  most  degraded  sections  of  our  race — a  theory 
received  only  with  considerable  abatements  by  civilized  na 
tions — a  theory  in  which  men's  confidence  diminishes  as  fast 
as  society  advances — and  we  may  safely  pronounce  that 
theory  to  be  a  false  one.  On  such,  along  with  other  evi 
dence,  the  subordination  of  sex  was  lately  condemned. 
Those  commonly-observed  facts,  that  the  enslavement  of 
woman  is  invariably  associated  with  a  low  type  of  social 
life,  and  that  conversely,  her  elevation  toward  an  equality 
with  man  uniformly  accompanies  progress,  were  cited  in 
part  proof  that  the  subjection  of  female  to  male  is  essen 
tially  wrong.  If  now,  instead  of  icomen  we  read  children, 
similar  facts  may  be  cited,  and  a  similar  deduction  may  be 
drawn.  If  it  be  true  that  the  dominion  of  man  over 
woman  has  been  oppressive  in  proportion  to  the  badness 
of  the  age  or  the  people,  it  is  also  true  that  parental 
authority  has  been  stringent  and  unlimited  in  a  like  pro 
portion.  If  it  be  a  fact  that  the  emancipation  of  women 
has  kept  pace  with  the  emancipation  of  society,  it  is  like 
wise  a  fact  that  the  once  despotic  rule  of  the  old  over  the 
young  has  been  ameliorated  at  the  same  rate.  And  if,  in 
our  own  day,  we  find  the  fast-spreading  recognition  of 
popular  rights  accompanied  by  a  silently-growing  percep 
tion  of  the  rights  of  women,  we  also  find  it  accompanied 
by  a  tendency  toward  systems  of  non-coercive  education 
— that  is,  toward  a  practical  admission  of  the  rights  of 
children. 

Whoever  wants  illustrations  of  this  alleged  harmony 
between  the  political,  connubial,  and  filial  relationships, 
may  discover  them  anywhere  and  everywhere.  Scanning 
that  aboriginal  state  of  existence  during  which  the  aggres 
sive  conduct  of  man  to  man  renders  society  scarcely  possi 
ble,  he  will  see  not  only  that  wives  are  slaves  and  exist 
by  sufferance,  but  that  children  hold  their  lives  by  the 
same  tenure,  and  are  sacrificed  to  the  gods  when  fathers 


TENDENCY   TO   THEIR   PEACTICAL   ADMISSION.          199 

so  will.  He  may  observe  how  during  the  classic  times,  the 
thraldom  of  five-sixths  of  the  population  was  accompanied 
both  by  a  theory  that  the  child  is  the  property  and  slave 
of  its  male  parent,  and  by  a  legal  fiction  which  regarded 
wives,  as  children  similarly  owned.  That  political  degra 
dation  of  the  present  East-Indian  races  for  whom  absolute 
monarchy  seems  still  the  only  possibly  form  of  rule,  he 
will  find  accompanied  alike  by  suttees  and  by  infanticide. 
The  same  connection  of  facts  will  be  seen  by  him  in  China, 
where  under  a  government  purely  autocratic,  there  exists 
a  public  opinion  which  deems  it  an  unpardonable  offence 
for  a  wife  to  accuse  her  husband  to  the  magistrate,  and 
which  ranks  filial  disobedience  as  a  crime  next  in  atrocity 
to  murder.  Nor  is  our  own  history  barren  of  illustra 
tions.  On  reviewing  those  times  when  constitutional 
liberty  was  but  a  name,  when  men  were  denied  freedom 
of  speech  and  belief,  when  the  people's  representatives 
were  openly  bribed  and  justice  was  bought — the  times, 
too,  with  which  the  laws  enacting  the  servitude  of  women 
were  in  complete  harmony — the  observer  cannot  fail  to  be 
struck  with  the  harshness  of  parental  behaviour,  and  the 
attitude  of  humble  subjection  which  sons  and  daughters 
had  to  assume.  Between  the  close  of  the  last  century, 
when  our  domestic  condition  was  marked  by  the  use  of 
Sir  and  Madam  in  addressing  parents,  and  by  the  doc 
trine  that  a  child  ought  unhesitatingly  to  marry  whomso 
ever  a  father  appointed ;  and  when  our  political  condition 
was  marked  by  aristocratic  supremacy,  by  the  occurrence 
of  church-and-king  riots,  and  by  the  persecution  of  reform 
ers — between  that  day  and  ours,  the  decline  in  the  rigour 
of  paternal  authority  and  in  the  severity  of  political  op 
pression,  has  been  simultaneous.  And,  as  already  re 
marked,  the  like  companionship  of  facts  is  seen  in  the  pres 
ent  rapid  growth  of  democratic  feeling,  and  the  equally 
rapid  spread  of  a  milder  system  of  juvenile  training. 


200  THE   EIGHTS   OF   CHILDEEN. 

Thus,  the  biography  of  the  race  affords  ample  illustra 
tion  of  the  alleged  law.  That  uniformity  of  moral  tone, 
which  it  was  asserted  must  necessarily  pervade  a  nation's 
arrangements — social,  marital,  and  parental — we  see  exem 
plified  alike  under  all  phases  of  civilization.  Indeed  this 
position  hardly  needed  proof,  being,  as  it  is,  a  direct 
corollary  from  self-evident  truths.  As  surely  as  a  man's 
character  shines  through  all  his  deeds,  so  surely  does  the 
character  of  a  people  shine  through  all  its  laws  and  cus 
toms.  Having  a  common  root  in  human  nature,  cotempo- 
rary  institutions  cannot  fail  to  be  equally  affected  by  the 
imperfection  of  that  nature.  They  must  all  be  right  or 
wrong  together.  The  evil  which  taints  one  must  taint  all. 
The  change  which  reforms  one  must  at  the  same  time  re 
form  all.  The  progress  which  perfects  one  must  eventually 
perfect  all. 

Consequently,  whoever  admits  that  injustice  is  still 
visible  in  the  dealings  of  class  with  class — whoever  admits 
that  it  similarly  exhibits  itself  in  the  behaviour  of  one  sex 
to  the  other,  cannot  but  admit  that  it  necessarily  exists  in 
the  conduct  of  the  old  to  the  young.  And  he  must  fur 
ther  admit  that  being  most  implicity  received  amongst 
the  most  barbarous  nations,  and  waning  as  its  influ 
ence  does  with  the  advance  of  civilization,  the  doctrine 
of  filial  subjection  is  entirely  condemned  by  its  asso 
ciations. 

§  4.  If  coercive  education  be  right,  it  must  be  pro 
ductive  of  good,  and  if  wrong,  of  evil.  By  an  analysis  of 
its  results,  therefore,  we  shall  obtain  so  much  evidence  for 
or  against  the  doctrine  that  the  liberties  of  children  are 
coextensive  with  those  of  adults. 

That  coercive  education  is  impolitic,  may  be  strongly 
suspected  from  the  fact  lately  adverted  to — the  evident 
disposition  toward  the  abandonment  of  it  which  modern 


EFFECTS    OF   COEECIVE   EDUCATION.  201 

systems  of  training  evince.  Considering  what  universal 
attention  the  culture  of  the  young  has  lately  received — 
the  books  written  about  it,  the  lectures  delivered  on  it, 
the  experiments  made  to  elucidate  it — there  is  reason  for 
concluding  that  as  the  use  of  brute  force  for  educational 
purposes  has  greatly  declined,  something  radically  wrong 
must  be  involved  in  it.  But  without  dwelling  upon  this, 
which,  like  all  inferences  drawn  from  expediency,  is  liable 
to  have, its  premises  called  in  question,  let  us  judge  of 
coercive  education  not  by  the  effects  it  is  believed  to 
produce,  but  by  those  it  must  produce. 

^Education  has  for  its  object  the  formation  of  character. 
To  curb  restive  propensities,  to  awaken  dormant  senti 
ments,  to  strengthen  the  perceptions  and  cultivate  the 
tastes,  to  encourage  this  feeling  and  repress  that,  so  as 
finally  to  develop  the  child  into-  a  man  of  well-proportioned 
and  harmonious  nature — this  is  alike  the  aim  of  parent 
and  teacher.  Those,  therefore,  who  advocate  the  use  of 
authority,  and  if  need  be — force  in  the  management  of 
children,  must  do  so  because  they  think  these  the  best 
means  of  compassing  the  desired  object — formation  of 
character.  *  Paternity  has  to  devise  some  kind  of  rule  for 
the  nursery.  Impelled  partly  by  the  creed,  partly  by  cus 
tom,  partly  by  inclination,  paternity  decides  in  favour  of 
a  pure  despotism,  proclaims  its  word  the  supreme  law, 
anathematizes  disobedience,  and  exhibits  the  rod  as  the 
final  arbiter  in  all  disputes.  And  of  course  this  system  of 
discipline  is  defended  as  the  one  best  calculated  to  curb  res 
tive  propensities,  awaken  dormant  sentiments,  &c.,  <fcc.,  as 
aforesaid.  Suppose,  now,  we  inquire  how  the  plan  works. 
An  unamiable  little  urchin  is  pursuing  his  own  gratifica 
tion  regardless  of  the  comfort  of  others — is  perhaps  annoy- 
ingly  vociferous  in  his  play ;  or  is  amusing  himself  by 
teasing  a  companion ;  or  is  trying  to  monopolize  the  toys 
intended  for  others  in  common  with  himself.  Well;  some 


202  THE   EIGHTS    OF      CHILDEEN. 

kind  of  interposition  is  manifestly  called  for.  Paternity, 
with  knit  brows,  and  in  a  severe  tone,  commands  desist- 
ance — visits  any  thing  like  reluctant  submission  with  a 
sharp  "  Do  as  I  bid  you  " — if  need  be,  hints  at  a  whipping 
or  the  black  hole — in  short  carries  coercion,  or  the  threat 
of  coercion,  far  enough  to  produce  obedience.  After 
sundry  exhibitions  of  perverse  feeling,  the  child  gives  in ; 
showing,  however,  by  its  sullenness  the  animosity  it  enter 
tains.  Meanwhile  paternity  pokes  the  fire  and  compla 
cently  resumes  the  newspaper  under  the  impression  that 
all  is  as  it  should  be :  most  unfortunate  mistake  ! 

If  the  thing  wanted  had  been  the  mere  repression  of 
noise,  or  the  mechanical  transfer  of  a  plaything,  perhaps 
no  better  course  could  have  been  pursued.  Had  it  been 
of  no  consequence  under  what  impulse  the  child  acted,  so 
long  as  it  fulfilled  a  given  mandate,  nothing  would  remain 
to  be  said.  But  something  else  was  needed.  Character 
was  the  thing  to  be  changed  rather  than  conduct.  It  was 
not  the  deeds,  but  the  feeling  from  which  the  deeds  sprung 
that  required  dealing  with.  Here  were  palpable  manifes 
tations  of  selfishness — an  indifference  to  the  wishes  of 
others,  a  marked  desire  to  tyrannize,  an  endeavour  to  en 
gross  benefits  intended  for  all — in  short,  here  were  exhibi 
tions  on  a  small  scale  of  that  unsympathetic  nature  to 
which  our  social  evils  are  mainly  attributable.  What, 
then,  was  the  thing  wanted  ?  Evidently  an  alteration  in 
the  child's  disposition.  What  was  the  problem  to  be 
solved  ?  Clearly  to  generate  a  state  of  mind  which  had  it 
previously  existed  would  have  prevented  the  offending 
actions.  What  was  the  final  end  to  be  achieved?  Un 
questionably  the  formation  of  a  character  which  should 
spontaneously  produce  greater  generosity  of  conduct. 
Or,  speaking  definitely,  it  was  necessary  to  strengthen 
that  sympathy  to  the  weakness  of  which  this  ill  behav 
iour  was  traceable. 


EDUCATION   OF   THE   SYMPATHIES.  203 

But  sympathy  can  be  strengthened  only  by  exercise. 
No  faculty  whatever  will  grow,  save  by  the  performance 
of  its  special  function — a  muscle  by  contraction;  the 
intellect  by  perceiving  and  thinking ;  a  moral  sentiment 
by  feeling.  Sympathy,  therefore,  can  be  increased  only 
by  exciting  sympathetic  emotions.  A  selfish  child  is  to 
be  rendered  less  selfish,  only  by  arousing  in  it  a  fellow- 
feeling  with  the  desires  of  others.  If  this  is  not  done, 
nothing  is  done. 

Observe,  then,  how  the  case  stands.  A  grasping  hard- 
natured  boy  is  to  be  humanized — is  to  have  whatever 
germ  of  better  spirit  may  be  in  him  developed ;  and  to 
this  end  it  is  proposed  to  use  frowns,  threats,  and  the 
stick !  To  stimulate  that  faculty  which  originates  our 
regard  for  the  happiness  of  others,  we  are  told  to  inflict 
pain,  or  the  fear  of  pain  !  The  problem  is — to  generate  in 
a  child's  mind  a  sympathetic  feeling ;  and  the  answer  is 
— beat  it,  or  send  it  supperless  to  bed  ! 

Thus  we  have  but  to  reduce  the  subjection- theory  to  a 
definite  form  to  render  its  absurdity  self-evident.  Con 
trasting  the  means  to  be  employed  with  the  work  to  be 
done,  we  are  at  once  struck  with  their  utter  unfitness. 
Instead  of  creating  a  new  internal  state  which  shall  exhibit 

O 

itself  in  better  deeds,  coercion  can  manifestly  do  nothing 
but  forcibly  mould  externals  into  a  coarse  semblance  of 
such  a  state.  In  the  family,  as  in  society,  it  can  simply 
restrain ;  it  cannot  educate.  Just  as  the  recollection  of 
Bridewell,  and  the  dread  of  a  policeman,  whilst  they 
serve  to  check  the  thief's  depredations,  effect  no  change 
in  his  morals,  so,  although  a  father's  threats  may  produce 
in  a  child  a  certain  outside  conformity  with  rectitude,  they 
cannot  generate  any  real  attachment  to  it.  As  some  one 
has  well  said,  the  utmost  that  severity  can  do  is  to  make 
hypocrites ;  it  can  never  make  converts. 


THE   EIGHTS    OF    CHILDREN. 

§  5.  Let  those  who  have  no  faith  in  any  instrumen 
talities  for  the  rule  of  human  beings,  save  the  stern  will 
and  the  strong  hand,  visit  the  Hanwell  Asylum  for  the 
insane.  Let  all  self-styled  practical  men,  who,  in  the 
pride  of  their  semi-savage  theories,  shower  sarcasms  upon 
the  movements  for  peace,  for  the  abolition  of  capital  pun 
ishments  and  the  like,  go  and  witness  to  their  confusion 
how  a  thousand  lunatics  can  be  managed  without  the  use 
of  force.  Let  these  sneerers  at  "  sentimentalisms  "  reflect 
on  the  horrors  of  madhouses  as  they  used  to  be ;  where 
was  weeping  and  wailing  and  gnashing  of  teeth,  where 
chains  clanked  dismally,  and  where  the  silence  of  the  night 
was  rent  by  shrieks  that  made  the  belated  passer-by  hurry 
on  shudderingly ;  let  them  contrast  with  these  horrors, 
the  calmness,  the  contentment,  the  tractability,  the  im 
proved  health  of  mind  and  body,  and  the  not  unfre- 
quent  recoveries,  that  have  followed  the  abandonment  of 
the  strait-jacket  regime:*  and  then  let  them  blush  for 
their  creed. 

And  shall  the  poor  maniac,  with  diseased  feelings  and 
a  warped  intellect,  persecuted  as  he  constantly  is  by  the 
suggestions  of  a  morbid  imagination,  shall  a  being  with  a 
mind  so  hopelessly  chaotic  that  even  the  most  earnest 
pleader  for  human  rights  would  make  his  case  an  excep 
tion,  shall  he  be  amenable  to  a  non-coercive  treatment,  and 
shall  a  child  not  be  amenable  to  it  ?  Will  any  one  main 
tain  that  madmen  can  be  managed  by  suasion,  but  not  chil 
dren  ?  that  moral-force  methods  are  best  for  those  deprived 
"of  reason,  but  physical-force  methods  for  those  possessing 
it  ?  Hardly.  The  boldest  defender  of  domestic  despot 
ism  will  not  assert  so  much.  If  by  judicious  conduct  the 
confidence  even  of  the  insane  may  be  obtained — if  even  to 
the  beclouded  intelligence  of  a  lunatic,  kind  attentions 
and  a  sympathetic  manner  will  carry  the  conviction  that 

*  See  Dr.  Conolly  on  Lunatic  Asylums. 


GOVERNMENT   BY   KINDNESS.  205 

he  is  surrounded  by  friends  and  not  by  demons — and  if, 
under  that  conviction,  even  he,  though  a  slave  to  every 
disordered  impulse,  becomes  comparatively  docile,  how 
much  more  under  the  same  influence  will  a  child  become 
so.  Do  but  gain  a  boy's  trust ;  convince  him  by  your 
behaviour  that  you  have  his  happiness  at  heart ;  let  him 
discover  that  you  are  the  wiser  of  the  two ;  let  him  experi 
ence  the  benefits  of  following  your  advice,  and  the  evils 
that  arise  from  disregarding  it;  and  fear  not  you  will 
readily  enough  guide  him.  Not  by  authority  is  your  sway 
to  be  obtained  ;  neither  by  reasoning ;  but  by  inducement. 
Show  in  all  your  conduct  that  you  are  thoroughly  your 
child's  friend,  and  there  is  nothing  that  you  may  notflead 
him  to.  The  faintest  sign  of  your  approval  or  dissent  will 
be  his  law.  You  have  won  from  him  the  key  of  all  his  feel 
ings  ;  and,  instead  of  the  vindicative  passions  that  severe 
treatment  would  have  aroused,  you  may  by  a  word  call 
forth  tears,  or  blushes,  or  the  thrill  of  sympathy — may 
excite  any  emotion  you  please — may,  in  short,  effect  some 
thing  worth  calling  education. 

§  6.  If  we  wish  a  boy  to  become  a  good  mechanic, 
we  insure  his  expertness  by  an  early  apprenticeship.  The 
young  musician  that  is  to  be,  passes  several  hours  a  day 
at  his  instrument.  Initiatory  courses  of  outline  drawing 
and  shading  are  gone  through  by  the  intended  artist. 
For  the  future  accountant,  a  thorough  drilling  in  arithme 
tic  is  prescribed.  The  reflective  powers  are  sought  to  be 
developed  by  the  study  of  mathematics.  Thus,  all  train 
ing  is  founded  on  the  principle  that  culture  must  precede 
proficiency.  In  such  proverbs  as — "Habit  is  second 
nature,"  and  "Practice  makes  perfect,"  men  have  ex 
pressed  those  net  products  of  universal  observation  on 
which  every  educational  system  is  ostensibly  based.  The 
maxims  of  a  village  schoolmistress  and  the  speculations  of 


206  THE   EIGHTS    OF   CHILDREN. 

a  Pestalozzi  are  alike  pervaded  by  the  thory  that  the  child 
should  be  accustomed  to  those  exertions  of  body  and  mind 
which  will  in  future  life  be  required  of  it.  Education 
means  this  or  nothing. 

What  now  is  the  most  important  attribute  of  man  as 
a  moral  being  ?  What  faculty  above  all  others  should  we 
be  solicitous  to  cultivate?  May  we  not  answer — the 
faculty  of  self-control  ?  This  it  is  which  forms  a  chief  dis 
tinction  between  the  human  being  and  the  brute.  It  is  in 
virtue  of  this  that  man  is  defined  as  a  creature  "  looking 
before  and  after."  It  is  in  their  larger  endowment  of  this 
that  the  civilized  races  are  superior  to  the  savage.  In 
supremacy  of  this  consists  one  of  the  perfections  of  the 
ideal  man.  Not  to  be  impulsive — not  to  be  spurred 
hither  and  thither  by  each  desire  that  in  turn  comes  upper 
most  ;  but  to  be  self-restrained,  self-balanced,  governed  by 
the  joint  decision  of  the  feelings  in  council  assembled,  be 
fore  whom  every  action  shall  have  been  fully  debated  and 
calmly  determined — this  it  is  which  education — moral 
education  at  least — strives  to  produce. 

But  the  power  of  self-government,  like  all  other  powers, 
can  be  developed  only  by  exercise.  Whoso  is  to  rule  over 
his  passions  in  maturity,  must  be  practised  in  ruling  over 
his  passions  during  youth.  Observe,  then,  the  absurdity 
of  the  coercive  system.  Instead  of  habituating  a  boy  to 
be  a  law  to  himself  as  he  is  required  in  after-life  to  be;  it 
administers  the  law  for  him.  Instead  of  preparing  him 
against  the  day  wjien  he  shall  leave  the  paternal  roof,  by 
inducing  him  to  fix  the  boundaries  of  his  actions  and  vol 
untarily  confine  himself  within  them,  it  marks  out  these 
boundaries  for  him,  and  says — "  cross  them  at  your  peril." 
Here  we  have  a  being  who,  in  a  few  years,  is  to  become 
his  own  master,  and,  by  way  of  fitting  him  for  such  a  con 
dition,  he  is  allowed  to  be  his  own  master  as  little  as 
possible.  Whilst  in  every  other  particular  it  is  thought 


EVILS   OF   COERCIVE   DISCIPLINE.  207 

desirable  that  what  the  man  will  have  to  do,  the  child 
should  be  well  drilled  in  doing,  in  this  most  important  of 
all  particulars — the  controlling  of  himself— it  is  thought 
that  the  less  practice  he  has  the  better.  No  wonder  that 
those  who  have  been  brought  up  under  the  severest  dis 
cipline  should  so  frequently  turn  out  the  wildest  of  the 
wild.  Such  a  result  is  just  what  might  have  been  looked 
for. 

.  Indeed,  not  only  does  the  physical-force  system  fail  to 
fit  the  youth  for  his  future  position ;  it  absolutely  tends 
to  unfit  him.  Were  slavery  to  be  his  lot — if  his  after 
life  had  to  be  passed  under  the  rule  of  a  Russian  auto 
crat,  or  of  an  American  cotton  planter,  no  better  method 
of  training  could  be  devised  than  one  which  accustomed 
him  to  that  attitude  of  complete  subordination  he  would 
subsequently  have  to  assume.  But  just  to  the  degree 
in  which  such  treatment  would  fit  him  for  servitude, 
must  it  unfit  him  for  being  a  free  man  amongst  free 
men. 

§  7.  But  why  is  education  needed  at  all  ?  Why 
does  not  the  child  grow  spontaneously  into  a  normal 
human  being  ?  Why  should  it  be  requisite  to  curb  this 
propensity,  to  stimulate  the  other  sentiment,  and  thus  by 
artificial  aids  to  mould  the  mind  into  something  different 
from  what  it  would  of  itself  become  ?  Is  not  there  here 
an  anomaly  in  nature  ?  Throughout  the  rest  of  creation 
we  find  the  seed  and  the  embryo  attaining  to  perfect  ma 
turity  without  external  aid.  Drop  an  acorn  into  the 
ground,  and  it  will  in  due  time  become  a  healthy  oak 
without  either  pruning  or  training.  The  insect  passes 
through  its  several  transformations  unhelped,  and  arrives 
at  its  final  form  possessed  of  every  needful  capacity  and 
instinct.  No  coercion  is  needed  to  make  the  young  bird 
or  quadruped  adopt  the  habits  proper  to  its  future  life. 


208  THE   EIGHTS   OF   CHILDBED. 

Its  character  like  its  body,  spontaneously  assumes  com 
plete  fitness  for  the  part  it  has  to  play  in  the  world.  How 
happens  it,  then,  that  the  human  mind  alone  tends  to 
develop  itself  w^rongly  ?  Must  there  not  be  some  excep 
tional  cause  for  this  ?  Manifestly :  and  if  so  a  true  theory 
of  education  must  recognize  this  cause. 

It  is  an  indisputable  fact  that  the  moral  constitution 
which  fitted  man  for  his  original  predatory  state,  differs 
from  the  one  needed  to  fit  him  for  this  social  state  to 
which  multiplication  of  the  race  has  led.  In  a  foregoing 
part  of  our  inquiry  (Chap.  II.),  it  was  shown  that  the  law 
of  adaptation  is  effecting  a  transition  from  the  one  consti 
tution  to  the -other.  Living  then,  as  we  do,  in  the  midst 
of  this  transition,  we  must  expect  to  find  sundry  phenom 
ena  which  are  explicable  only  upon  the  hypothesis  that 
humanity  is  at  present  partially  adapted  to  both  these 
states,  and  not  completely  to  either — has  only  in  a  degree 
lost  the  dispositions  needed  for  savage  life,  and  has  but 
imperfectly  acquired  those  needed  for  social  life.  The 
anomaly  just  specified  is  one  of  these.  The  tendency  of 
each  new  generation  to  develop  itself  wrongly,  indicates 
the  degree  of  modification  that  has  yet  to  take  place. 
Those  respects  in  which  a  child  requires  restraint,  are  just 
the  respects  in  which  he  is  taking  ^after  the  aboriginal 
man.  The  selfish  squabbles  of  the  nursery,  the  persecu 
tion  of  the  play-ground,  the  lyings  and  petty  thefts,  the 
rough  treatment  of  inferior  creatures,  the t  propensity,  to 
destroy — all  these  imply  that  tendency  to  pursue  gratifi 
cation  at  the  expense  of  other  beings,  which  qualified 
man  for  the  wilderness,  and  which  disqualifies  him  for 
civilized  life. 

We  have  seen,  however,  that  this  incongruity  between 
man's  attributes  and  his  conditions  is  in  course  of  being 
remedied.  We  have  seen  that  the  instincts  of  the  savage 
must  die  of  inanition — that  the  sentiments  called  forth  by 


EVILS    OF   COERCIVE   TRAINING.  209 

the  social  state  must  grow  by  exercise,  and  that  if  the 
laws  of  life  remain  constant,  this  modification  will  con 
tinue  until  our  desires  are  brought  into  perfect  conformity 
with  our  circumstances.  When  now  that  ultimate  state 
in  Avhich  morality  shall  have  become  organic  is  arrived 
at,  this  anomaly  in  the  development  of  the  child's  charac 
ter  will  have  disappeared.  The  young  human  being  will 
no  longer  be  an  exception  in  nature — will  not  as  now  tend 
to  grow  into  unfitness  for  the  requirements  of  after-life,  but 
will  spontaneously  unfold  itself  into  that  ideal  manhood, 
whose  every  impulse  coincides  with  the  dictates  of  the 
moral  law. 

Education,  therefore,  in  so  far  as  it  seeks  to  form  char 
acter,  serves  only  a  temporary  purpose,  and,  like  other 
institutions  resulting  from  the  non-adaptation  of  man  to 
the  social  state,  must  in  the  end  die  out.  Hence  we  see 
how  doubly  incongruous  Avith  the  moral  law,  is  the  system 
of  training  by  coercion.  Not  only  does  it  necessitate 
direct  violations  of  that  law,  but  the  very  work  which  it 
so  futilely  attempts  to  perform,  will  not  need  performing 
when  that  law  has  attained  to  its  final  supremacy.  Force 
in  the  domestic  circle,  like  magisterial  force,  is  merely  the 
complement  of  immorality :  immorality  we  have  found  to 
be  resolvable  into  non-adaptation :  non-adaptation  must 
in  time  cease :  and  thus  the  postulate  with  which  this  old 
theory  of  education  starts  will  eventually  become  false. 
Rods  and  ferules,  equally  with  the  staffs  and  handcuffs  of 
the  constable ;  the  gaoler's  keys ;  the  swords,  bayonets,  and 
cannon,  with  which  nations  restrain  each  other,  are  the 
offspring  of  iniquity — can  exist  only  whilst  supported  by 
it,  and  necessarily  share  in  the  badness  of  their  parentage. 
Born  therefore  as  it  is  of  man's  imperfections — governing 
as  it  does  by  means  of  those  imperfections — and  abdicat 
ing  as  it  must  when  Equity  begins  to  reign,  Coercion 
in  all  its  forms — educational  or  other — is  essentially 
vicious. 


210  THE   EIGHTS    OF   CHILDREN. 

§  8.  And  here  we  are  naturally  led  to  remark  once 
more  the  necessary  incongruity  between  the  perfect  law 
and  the  imperfect  man.  Whatsoever  of  Utopianism  there 
may  seem  to  be  in  the  foregoing  doctrines,  is  due  not  to 
any  error  in  them  but  to  faults  in  ourselves.  A  partial 
impracticability  must  not  perplex  us ;  must,  on  the  contrary, 
be  expected.  Just  in  proportion  to  our  distance  below 
the  purely  moral  state,  must  be  our  difficulty  in  acting  up 
to  the  moral  law,  either  in  the  treatment  of  children  or  in 
any  thing  else.  It  is  not  for  us,  however,  to  magnify  and 
ponder  over  this  difficulty.  Our  course  is  simple.  We 
have  just  to  fulfil  the  law  as  -far  as  in  us  lies,  resting  satis 
fied  that  the  limitations  necessitated  by  our  present  condi 
tion  will  quite  soon  enough  assert  themselves. 

Meanwhile  let  it  be  remarked  that  the  main  obstacle 
to  the  right  conduct  of  education  lies  rather  in  the  parent 
than  in  the  child.  It  is  not  that  the  child  is  insensible  to 
influences  higher  than  that  of  force,  but  that  the  parent  is 
not  virtuous  enough  to  use  them.  Fathers  and  mothers 
who  enlarge  upon  the  trouble  which  filial  misbehaviour 
entails  upon  them,  strangely  assume  that  all  the  blame  is 
due  to  the  evil  propensities  of  their  offspring  and  none  to 
their  own.  Though  on  their  knees  they  confess  to  being 
miserable  sinners,  yet  to  hear  their  complaints  of  unduti- 
ful  sons  and  daughters  you  might  suppose  that  they  were 
themselves  immaculate.  They  forget  that  the  depravity 
of  their  children  is  a  reproduction  of  their  own  depravity. 
They  do  not  recognize  in  these  much-scolded,  often-beaten 
little  ones,  so  many  looking-glasses  wherein  they  may  see 
reflected  their  own  selfishness.  It  would  astonish  them  to 
assert  that  they  behave  as  improperly  to  their  children  as 
their  children  do  to  them.  Yet  a  little  candid  self-analy 
sis  would  show  them  that  half  their  commands  are  issued 
more  for  their  own  convenience  or  gratification  than  for 
corrective  purposes.  "  I  won't  have  that  noise ! "  exclaims 


PAKENTAL   LOVE   OF   DOMINION.  211 

a  disturbed  father  to  some  group  of  vociferous  juveniles : 
and  the  noise  ceasing,  he  claims  to  have  done  something 
toward  making  his  family  orderly.  Perhaps  he  has ;  but 
how  ?  By  exhibiting  that  same  evil  disposition  which  he 
seeks  to  check  in  his  children — a  determination  to  sacrifice 
to  his  own  happiness  the  happiness  of  others.  Observe, 
too,  the  impulse  under  which  a  refractory  child  is  pun 
ished.  Instead  of  anxiety  for  the  delinquent's  welfare, 
that  severe  eye  and  .compressed  lip  denote  rather  the  ire 
of  an  offended  ruler — express  some  such  inward  thought 
as  "  You  little  wretch,  we'll  soon  see  who  is  to  be  master." 
Uncover  its  roots,  and  the  theory  of  parental  authority 
will  be  found  to  grow  not  out  of  man's  love  for  his  offspring 
but  out  of  his  love  of  dominion.  Let  any  one  who 
doubts  this  listen  to  that  common  reprimand,  "  How  dare 
you  disobey  me  ?  "  and  then  consider  what  the  emphasis 
means.  No,  no,  moral-force  education  is  widely  prac 
ticable  even  now,  if  parents  were  civilized  enough  to 
use  it. 

But  of  course  the  obstacle  is  in  a  measure  reciprocal. 
Even  the  best  samples  of  childhood  as  we  now  know  it 
will  be  occasionally  unmanageable  by  suasion  :  and  when 
inferior  natures  have  to  be  dealt  with,  the  difficulty  of 
doing  without  coercion  must  be  proportionably  great. 
Nevertheless  patience,  self-denial,  a  sufficient  insight 
into  youthful  emotions,  and  a  due  sympathy  with  them, 
added  to  a.  little  ingenuity  in  the  choice  of  means,  will 
usually  accomplish  all  that  can  be  wished.  Only  let 
a  parent's  actions  and  words  and  manner  show  that  his 
own  feeling  is  a  thoroughly  right  one,  and  he  will  rarely 
fail  to  awaken  a  responsive  feeling  in  the  breast  of  his 
child. 

§  9.  One  further  objection  remains  to  be  noticed. 
It  will  probably  be  said  that  if  the  rights  of  children  are 


212  THE   EIGHTS   OF   CIIILDEEN. 

coextensive  with  those  of  adults,  it  must  follow  that  chil 
dren  are  equally  entitled  with  adults  to  citizenship,  and 
ought  to  be  similarly  endowed  with  political  power.  '  This 
inference  looks  somewhat  alarming ;  and  it  is  easy  to 
imagine  the  triumphant  air  of  those  who  draw  it,  and  the 
smiles  with  which  they  meditate  upon  the  absurdities  it 
suggests.  Nevertheless  the  answer  is  simple  and  decisive. 
There  must  go  two  things  to  originate  an  incongruity ; 
and,  before  passing  censure,  it  is  needful  say  which  of  the 
two  incongruous  things  is  in  fault.  In  the  present  case 
the  incongruity  is  between  the  institution  of  government 
on  the  one  side,  and  a  certain  consequence  of  the  law  of 
equal  freedom  on  the  other.  Which  of  the  two  is  to  be 
condemned  for  this  ?  In  the  above  objection  it  is  tacitly 
assumed  that  the  blame  lies  with  this  consequence  of  the 
law  of  equal  freedom :  whereas  the  fact  is  just  the  other 
way.-  It  is  with  the  institution  of  government  that  the 
blame  lies.  Were  the  institution  of  government  an  essen 
tially  right  one,  there  would  be  reason  to  suppose  that  our 
conclusion  was  fallacious ;  but  being  as  it  is  the  offspring 
of  immorality,  it  must  be  condemned  for  conflicting  with 
the  moral  law,  and  not  the  moral  law  for  conflicting  with 
it.  Were  the  moral  law  universally  obeyed,  government 
would  not  exist ;  and  did  government  not  exist,  the  moral 
law  could  not  dictate  the  political  enfranchisement  of 
children.  Hence  the  alleged  absurdity  is  traceable  to  the 
present  evil  constitution  of  society,  and  not  to  .some  defect 
in  our  conclusion. 

§  10.  Concerning  the  extension  of  the  law  o.  equal 
freedom  to  children,  we  must  therefore  say,  that  equity 
commands  it,  and  that  expediency  recommends  it.  We 
find  the  rights  of  children  to  be  deducible  from  the  same 
axiom,  and  by  the  same  argument  as  the  rights  of  adults ; 
whilst  denial  of  them  involves  us  in  perplexities  out  of 


EDUCATION  OF  THE  SYMPATHIES.         213 

which  there  seems  to  be  no  escape.  The  association 
between  filial  subservience  and  barbarism — the  evident 
kinship  of  filial  subservience  to  social  and  marital  slavery 
— and  the  fact  that  filial  subservience  declines  with  the 
advance  of  civilization,  suggest  that  such  subservience  is 
bad.  The  viciousness  of  a  coercive  treatment  of  children 
is  further  proved  by  its  utter  failure  to  accomplish  the 
chief  end  of  moral  education — the  culture  of  the  sympa 
thies  ;  by  its  tendency  to  excite  feelings  of  antagonism 
and  hate ;  and  by  the  check  which  it  necessarily  puts 
upon  the  development  of  the  all-important  faculty  of  self- 
control.  Whilst,  on  the  other  hand,  a  non-coercive  treat 
ment  being  favourable  to,  and  almost  necessitating,  con 
stant  appeals  to  the  higher  feelings,  must,  by  exercising 
those  feelings,  improve  the  character ;  and  must,  at  the 
same  time,  accustom  the  child  to  that  condition  of  .free 
dom  in  which  its  after-life  is  to  be  passed.  It  turns  out, 
too,  that  the  very  need  for  a  moral  training  of  children  is 
but  temporary,  and  that,  consequently,  a  true  theory  of 
the  filial  relationship  must  not  presuppose  like  the  com- 
mand-and-obedience  theory  that  such  a  need  is  permanent. 
Lastly,  we  find  reason  to  attribute  whatever  of  incompati 
bility  there  may  be  between  these  conclusions  and  our 
daily  experience,  not  to  any  error  in  them,  but  to  the 
necessary  incongruity  between  the  perfect  law  and  an  im 
perfect  humanity. 


PAET   III. 


A  ^  /i^... 


CHAPTEK    XVIII. 

POLITICAL   EIGHTS. 

§  1.  Our  principle  is  the  primordial  one.  It  is  the 
first  prerequisite  to  the  realization  of  the  Divine  will. 
Every  mode  of  interpreting  that  will  points  to  this  as  the 
all-essential  condition  of  its  fulfilment.  If  we  start  with 
an  d  priori  view  of  creative  design,  we  are  immediately 
led  to  the  law  of  e^iial  freedom  (Chap.  III.).  Do  we  ap 
peal  to  the  general  character  ;  oTthe  human  constitution  ? 
the  law  of  eanal  freedom  is  its  corollary-  (Chap.  IV.). 
And  when,  pursuing  the  examination  further,  we  observe 
the  detailed  arrangements  of  that  constitution,  we  dis 
cover  a  faculty  by  which  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  rec 
ognized  and  responded  to  (Chap.  V.).  Otherwise  viewed, 
this  law  is  seen  to  be  a  direct  deduction  from  the  necessi 
ties  of  existence  :  as  thus.  Life  depends  upon  the  per 
formance  of  certain  actions.  Abrogate  entirely  the  lib 
erty  to  exercise  the  faculties,  and  we  have  death  ;  abro 
gate  it  partially,  and  we  have  pain  or  partial  death.  This 
remains  true  of  man  whether  he  be  savage  or  civilized  — 
isolated  or  social.  And  as  there  must  be  life  before 


can  be  society,  this  first  principle  of  life  must 
dence  of  the  first  principle  of  society—  must  fix  or  govern 
it.     Or,  speaking  definitely,  as  liberty  to  exercise  the  fac-    s 
ulties  is  the  first  condition  of  individual  life,  the  liberty 
of  each,  Imiifed^nly  by  the  like  liberty  of  all,  must  be 
the  first  condition  of  social  lite. 

-—  -  Derived,  therefore,  as  it  is,  directlyfrom  the  Divine 
will,  and  und^rlyin^  ns  it.  rloos  the  right  organization  of 
society,  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  of  higher  authority  j 
10 


218  POLITICAL   RIGHTS. 

than  all  other  laws.  The  creative  purpose  demands  that 
every  tnTng~sMt  be  subordinated  to  it.  Institutions  and 
social  forms  must  just  marshal  themselves  as  it  commands. 
It  dates  from  the  creation ;  they  are  of  yesterday.  It  is 
constant ;  they  are  changeable.  It  appertains  to  the  per 
fect;  they  to  the  imperfect.  It  is  coenduring  with  hu 
manity  ;  they  may  die  to-morrow.  As  surely  then  as  the 
incidental  must  bow  before  the  necessary,  so  surely  must 
all  conventional  arrangements  be  subject  to  the  absolute 
moral  law. 

§  2.  Allusion  has  from  time  to  time  been  made  to  a 
school  of  politicians,  especially  claiming  for  themselves 
the  title  of  philosophical,  who  demur  to  this.  They  do 
not  recognize  any  such  supreme  authority  to  which  all 
human  regulations  must  bend.  Practically,  if  not  pro- 
V  fessedly,  they  hold,  with  Archelaus,  that  nothing  is  intrin 
sically  right  or  wrong ;  but  that  it  becomes  either  by  the 
dictum  of  the  state.  If  we  are  to  credit  them  govern 
ment  determines  what  shall  be  morality;  and /not  moral 
ity  what  shall  be  government.  They  believe  in  no  oracu 
lar  principle  by  whose  yea  or  nay  we  may  be  guided : 
their  Delphi  is  the  House  of  Commons.  By  their  account 
man  lives  and  moves  and  has  his  being  by  legislative  per 
mit.  His  freedom  to  do  this  or  that  is  not  natural,  but 
conferred.  The  question — Has  the  citizen  any  claim  to 
the  work  of  his  hands  ?  can  only  be  decided  by  a  parlia 
mentary  division.  If  "  the  ayes  have  it,"  he  has ;  if  "  the 
noes,"  he  has  not. 

The  reader  who  has  arrived  thus  far,  needs  not  to  have 
the  fallacy  of  this  doctrine  pointed  out.  The  expediency- 
system,  of  which  it  forms  an  essential  part,  has  been  re 
peatedly  proved  untenable,  and  with  it  must  fall  its  de 
pendent  propositions.  And  having,  moreover,  been  col 
laterally  refuted  in  foregoing  chapters,  the  notion  that 


REPULSIVE   FORCES   IN   PRIMITIVE    SOCIETY.  219 

man  has  no  rights  save  those  of  government  manufacture, 
might  safely  be  left  where  it  lies.  There  are,  however, 
additional  evidences  of  its  untruth,  which  it  may  be  as 
well  to  state.  And  first  let  us  inquire  how  it  has  origin 
ated. 

§  3.  Considering  society  as  a  corporate  body,  we  ! 
may  say  that  man,  when  he  first  enter^  into  it,  has  the  re 
pulsive  force  in  excess,  whilst  in  the  cohesive  force  he  is 
deficient.  His  passions  are  strong ;  his  sympathies  weak.  : 
Those  propensities  which  fitted  him  for  savage  life  neces 
sarily  tend  to  breed  war  between  himself  and  his  neigh 
bours.  His  condition  has  been  that  of  perpetual  antag 
onism  ;  and  his  antagonistic  habits  must  of  course  accom 
pany  him  into  the  social  state.  Aggression,  dispute,  an 
ger,  hatred,  revenge — these  are  the  several  stages  of  the 
process  by  which  the  members  of  a  primitive  community 
are  continually  being  sundered.  Hence  the  smallness  of 
the  first  communities.  Populations  burst  as  fast  as  they 
increase.  Races  split  into  tribes ;  tribes  into  factions. 
Only  as  civilization  advances  do  larger  unions  become 
possible.  And  even  these  have  to  pass  through  some  such,  j 
stage  as  that  of  feudalism,  with  its  small  chieftainships 
and  right  of  private  war,  showing  that  the  tendency  to 
repel  is  still  active. 

Now,  in  proportion  to  the  repulsive  force  subsisting 
between  atoms  of  matter,  must  be  the  restraint  required 
to  keep  them  from  exploding.  And  in  proportion  to  the 
repulsive  force  subsisting  between  the  units  of  a  society 
must  be  the  strength  of  the  bonds  requisite  to  prevent 
that  society  from  flying  to  pieces.  Some  powerful  con-  . 
centrative  influence  there  must  be  to  produce  even  these 
smallest  unions :  and  this  influence  must  be  strong  in  pro 
portion  to  the  savageness  of  the  people ;  otherwise  the 
unions  cannot  be  maintained.  Such  an  influence  we  have 


220  POLITICAL   EIGHTS. 

in  the  sentiment  of  veneration,  reverence  for  power,  loy- 
x"  alty,  or,  as  Carlyle  terms  it — hero-worship.  By  this  feel- 
•  ing  it  is,  that  society  begins  to  be  organized ;  and  where 
the  barbarism  is  greatest,  there  is  this  feeling  strongest. 
Hence  the  fact  that  all  traditions  abound  in  superhuman 
Hbeings,  in  giants  and  demigods.  The  mythical  accounts 
of  Bacchus  and  Hercules,  of  Thor  and  Odin,  and  of  the 
various  divine  and  ^half-divine  personages  who  figure  in 
the  early  histories  of  all  races,  merely  prove  the  intensity 
of  the  awe  with  which  superiority  was  once  regarded. 
In  that  belief  of  some  of  the  Polynesian  Islanders,  that 
only  their  chiefs  have  souls,  we  find  a  still  extant  example 
of  the  almost  incredible  influence  which  this  sentiment  of 
reverence  has  over  savage  men.  Through  it  only  does  all 
authority,  whether  that  of  ruler,  teacher,  or  priest,  become 
possible.  It  was  alike  the  parent  of  beliefs  in  the  miracu 
lous  conception  of  Gengis  Khan,  in  the  prophetic  charac 
ters  of  Zoroaster,  Confucius,  and  Mahomet,  and  in  the  in 
fallibility  of  the  Pope.  Where  it  no  longer  deifies  power, 
it  associates  it  with  divine  attributes.  Thus  it  was  death 
for  the  Assyrian  to  enter  unbidden  into  the  presence  of 
his  monarch.  The  still  stationary  Orientals  ascribe  to 
their  emperors  celestial  relationships.  Schamyl,  the 
prophet-chief  of  the  Circassians,  is  believed  to  have  entire 
union  with  the  Divine  essence.  And  the  Russian  soldiers 
pray  for  their  Czar  as  "  our  God  upon  earth."  The  fealty 
of  vassal  to  feudal  lord — the  devotion  of  Highland  Celt 
to  chief — were  exhibitions  of  the  same  feeling.  Loyalty 
it  made  the  brightest  virtue,  and  treason  the  blackest 

/time. 
With  the  advance  of  civilization  this  awe  of  power 
"Diminishes.     Instead  of  looking  up  to  the  monarch  as  a 
God,  it  begins  to  view  him  as  a  man  reigning  by  divine 
authority — as   "the   Lord's   anointed."       Submission  be 
comes  less  abject.     Subjects  no  longer   prostrate   them- 


ADAPTATION  TO   THE   SOCIAL   STATE.  221 

selves  before  their  rulers,  nor  do  serfs  kiss  their  master's 
feet.  Obedience  ceases  to  be  unlimited :  men  will  choose 
their  own  faiths.  Gradually,  as  there  grow  up  those  sen 
timents  which  lead  each  to  maintain  his  own  rights,  and 
sympathetically  to  respect  the  rights  of  others — gradually 
as  each,  thus,  by  the  acquirement  of  self-restraining  power, 
becomes  fitted  to  live  in  harmony  with  his  fellow — so 
gradually  do  men  cease  to  need  external  restraint,  and  so 
gradually  does  this  feeling  which  makes  them  submit  to 
that  external  restraint  decrease.  The  law  of  adaptation 
necessitates  this.  The  feeling  must  lose  power  just  as  fast 
as  it  ceases  to  be  needful.  As  the  new  regulator  grows, 
the  old  one  must  dwindle.  The  first  amelioration  of  a 
pure  despotism  is  a  partial  supplanting  of  the  one  by  the 
other.  Mixed  constitutions  exhibit  the  two  acting  con 
jointly.  And  whilst  the  one  advances  to  supremacy,  the 
other  sinks  into  decrepitude :  divine  right  of  kings  is  ex 
ploded,  and  monarchical  power  becomes  but  a  name. 

Although  the  adaptation  of  man  to  the  social  state  has 
already  made  considerable  progress — although  the  need 
for  external  restraint  is  less— and  although  consequently 
that  reverence  for  authority  which  makes  restraint  possi 
ble,  has  greatly  diminished — diminished  to  such  an  extent 
that  the  holders  of  power  are  daily  caricatured,  and  men 
begin  to  listen  to  the  National  Anthem  with  their  hats 
on — still  the  change  is  far  from  complete.  The  attributes 
of  the  aboriginal  man  have  not  yet  died  out.  We  still 
trench  upon  each  other's  claims — still  pursue  happiness  at 
each  other's  expense.  Our  savage  selfishness  is  seen  in 
commerce,  in  legislation,  in  social  arrangements,  in  amuse 
ments.  The  shopkeeper  imposes  on  his  lady  customer ; 
his  lady  customer  beats  down  the  shopkeeper.  Classes 
quarrel  about  their  respective  "  interests ; "  and  corrup 
tion  is  defended  by  those  who  profit  from  it.  The  spirit 
of  caste  morally  tortures  its  victims  with  as  much  cool- 


222  POLITICAL   EIGHTS. 

ness  as  the  Indian  tortures  his  enemy.  Gamblers  pocket 
their  gains  with  unconcern;  and  your  share-speculator 
cares  not  who  loses,  so  that  he  gets  his  premium.  No 
matter  w^hat  their  rank,  no  matter  in  what  they  are  en 
gaged — whether  in  enacting  a  Corn  Law,  or  in  struggling 
with  each  other  at  the  doors  of  a  theatre — men  show 
themselves  as  yet,  little  else  than  barbarians  in  broadcloth. 
Hence  we  still  require  shackles ;  rulers  to  impose  them ; 
and  power-worship  to  make  those  rulers  obeyed.  Just  as 
much  as  the  love  of  God's  law  is  deficient,  must  the  fear 
of  man's  law  be  called  in  to  supply  its  place.  And  to  the 
extent  that  man's  law  is  needful  there  must  be  reverence 
for  it  to  ensure  the  necessary  allegiance.  Hence,  as  men 
are  still  under  the  influence  of  this  sentiment,  we  must 
expect  their  customs,  creeds,  and  philosophies  to  testify 
of  its  presence. 

Here,  then,  we  have  a  rationale  of  the  expediency-idea 
of  government.  It  is  the  latest  and  most  refined  form  as 
sumed  by  this  disposition  to  exalt  the  state  at  the  expense 
of  the  individual.  There  have  been  books  written  to 
prove  that  the  monarch's  will  should  be  the  subject's  ab 
solute  law;  and  if  instead  of  monarch  we  read  legislature, 
we  have  the  expediency-theory.  It  merely  modifies  "  di 
vine  right  of  kings  "  into  divine  right  of  government.  It 
f  is  despotism  democratized.  Between  that  old  eastern  reg- 
s  ime  under  which  the  citizen  was  the  private  property  of 
his  ruler,  having  no  rights  at  all,  and  that  final  state  un 
der  which  his  rights  will  be  entire  and  inviolable,  there 
comes  this  intermediate  state  in  which  he  is  allowed  to 
possess  rights,  but  only  by  gugerance  of  parliament.  Thus 
the  expediency-philosophy  falls  naturally  into  its  place  as 
a  phenomena  attending  our  progress  from  past  slavery  to 
future  freedom.  It  is  one  of  a  series  of  creeds  through 
which  mankind  have  to  pass.  Like  each  of  its  predeces 
sors,  it  is  natural  to  a  certain  phase  of  human  develop- 


DOCTRINE   OF   THE   SOCIAL   CONTEACT.  223 

ment.     And  it  is  fated  to  lose  its  hold  as  fast  as  our  adap 
tation  to  the  social  state  increases. 

.„>  §  4.  It  is  only  by  bearing  in  mind  that  a  theory  of 
'some  kind  being  needful  for  men  they  will  espouse  any 
absurdity  in  default  of  something  better,  that  we  can  un 
derstand  how  Rousseau's  doctrine  of  Social  Contract  ever 
came  to  be  so  widely  received.  This  fact  remembered, 
however,  the  belief  in  such  a  doctrine  becomes  compre 
hensible.  Here  were  men  combined  together  under  gov 
ernment  and  law.  It  seemed  clear  that  the  arrangement 
was  on  the  whole  a  beneficial  one.  Hence  the  very  nat 
ural,  though  erroneous,  conclusion  that  state-authority  was 
a  moral  institute.  And  state-authority  being  taken  for  a 
moral  institute,  it  became  needful  to  account  for  it,  to  de 
fend  it,  to  reconcile  it  with  justice  and  truth.  Under 
which  stimulus  there  suggested  itself  this  theory  of  a  cov 
enant  originally  entered  into  between  individuals  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  community,  or  agents  acting  for  it,  on 
the  other,  by  which  allegiance  was  agreed  to  be  exchanged 
for  protection ;  and  in  virtue  of  which  supposed  covenant 
governments  continue  to  exercise  power  and  demand  obe 
dience. 

That  such  an  explanation  should  have  satisfied  the 
unthinking,  is  not  to  be  wondered  at ;  but  it  is  passing 
strange  that  it  should  have  gained  credence  amongst  edu 
cated  men.  Observe  the  battery  of  fatal  objections  which 
may  be  opened  upon  it. 

In  the  first  place,  the  assumption  is  a  purely  gratui 
tous  one.  Before  submitting  to  legislative  control  on  the 
strength  of  an  agreement  alleged  to  have  been  made  by 
our  forefathers,  we  ought  surelyJ^gJinyr  romo  proof  that 
such  agreemenlT  was  made!  But  no  proof  is  given.  On 
the  contrary,  the  facts,  so  far  as  we  can  ascertain  them, 
rather  imply  that  under  the  earliest  social  forms,  whether 


224:  POLITICAL    EIGHTS. 

savage,  patriarchal,  or  feudal,  obedience  to  authority  was 
given  unconditionally  •  and  that  when  the  ruler  afforded 
protection  it  was  because  he  resented  the  attempt  to  exer 
cise  over  one  of  his  subjects  a  power  similar  to  his  own — 
a  conclusion  quite  in  harmony  with  what  we  know  of  oaths 
of  allegiance  taken  in  later  times. 

Again;  even  supposing  the  contract  to  have  been  made, 
we  are  no  forwarder,  for  it  has  been  repeatedly  invalidated 
by  the  violation  of  its  terms.  There  is  no  people  but  what 
has  from  time  to  time  rebelled ;  and  there  is  no  govern 
ment  but  what  has,  in  an  infinity  of  cases,  failed  to  give 
the  promised  protection.  How,  then,  can  this  hypothetical 
contract  be  considered  binding,  when,  if  ever  made,  it  has 
been  broken  by  both  parties  ? 

But,  granting  the  agreement,  and  granting  that  noth 
ing  positive  has  occurred  to  vitiate  it,  we  have  still  to  be 
shown  on  what  principle  that  agreement,  made,  no  one 
knows  when,  by  no  one  knows  whom,  can  be  held  to 
tie  people  now  living.  Dynasties  have  changed,  and  dif 
ferent  forms  of  government  have  supplanted  each  other, 
since  the  alleged  transaction  could  have  taken  place ; 
whilst,  between  the  people  who  are  supposed  to  have 
been  parties  to  it,  and  their  existing  descendants,  unnum 
bered  generations  have  lived  and  died.  So  we  must 
assume  that  this  covenant  has  over  and  over  again  sur 
vived  the  deaths  of  all  parties  concerned !  Truly  a  strange 
power  this  which  our  forefathers  wielded — to  be  able  to 
fix  the  behaviour  of  their  descendants  for  all  futurity ! 
What  would  any  one  think  of  being  required  to  kiss  the 
Pope's  toe,  because  his  great-great-great-grandfather  prom 
ised  that  he  should  do  so  ? 

However,  there  never  was  such  a  contract.  If  there 
had  been,  constant  breaches  must  have  destroyed  it.  And 
even  if  undestroyed  it  could  not  bind  us,  but  only  those 
who  made  it. 


TEESUMPTUOTJS   CLAIMS   OF   LEGISLATURES.  225 

§  5.  The  self-importance  of  a  Malvolio  is  sufficiently 
ludicrous ;  but  we  must  go  far  beyond  it  to  parallel  the 
presumption  of  legislatures.  Some  steward  who,  deluded 
by  an  intense  craving  after  dominion,  and  an  impudence 
equal  to  his  craving,  should  construe  his  stewardship  into 
proprietorship,  would  more  fitly  illustrate  it.  Were  such 
an  one  to  argue  that  the  estate  he  was  appointed  to  man 
age  had  been  virtually  resigned  into  his  possession — that 
to  secure  the  advantages  of  his  administration  its  owner 
had  given  up  all  title  to  it — that  he  now  lived  on  it  only 
by  his  (the  steward's)  sufferance — and  that  he  was  in 
future  to  receive  no  emoluments  from  it,  except  at  his  (the 
steward's)  good  pleasure — then  should  we  have  an  appro 
priate  travesty  upon  the  behaviour  of  governments  to 
nations;  then  should  we  have  a  doctrine  perfectly  analo 
gous  to  this  fashionable  one,  which  teaches  how  men  on 
becoming  members  of  a  community,  give  up,  for  the  sake 
of  certain  sociaradvantages,  their  natural  right s7~  Adlier- 
ents  of  this  fashionable  doctrine  will  doubtless  protest 
against  such  an  interpretation  of  it.  They  have  no  rea 
sonable  cause  for  doing  so,  however,  as  will  appear  on 
submitting  them  to  a  cross-examination.  Suppose  we 
begin  it  thus : 

"  Your  hypothesis  that  men,  when  they  entered  into 
the  social  state,  surrendered  their  original  freedom,  im 
plies  that  they  entered  into  such  state  voluntarily,  does 
it  not  ?  " 

"  It  does." 

"  Then  they  must  have  considered  the  social  state 
preferable  to  that  under  which  they  had  previously 
lived  ?  " 

"  Necessarily." 

"  Why  did  it  appear  preferable  ?  " 

"  Because  it  offered  greater  security." 

"  Greater  security  for  what  ?  " 
10* 


226  POLITICAL   EIGHTS. 

"  Greater  security  for  life,  for  property,  for  the  things 
that  minister  to  happiness." 

"  Exactly.  To  get  more  happiness :  that  must  have 
been  the  object.  If  they  had  expected  to  get  more  un- 
happiness,  they  would  not  have  willingly  made  the  change, 
would  they  ?  " 

"No." 

"  Does  not  happiness  consist  in  the  due  satisfaction 
of  all  the  desires  ?  in  the  due  exercise  ©f  all  the 
faculties  ?  " 

"Yes."      , 

"  And  this  exercise  of  the  faculties  is  impossible  with 
out  freedom  of  action.  The  desires  cannot  be  satisfied 
without  liberty  to  pursue  and  use  the  objects  of  them." 

"  True." 

\/  "  ISTow  it  is  this  freedom  to  exercise  the  faculties  with 
in  specific  limits,  which  we  signify  by  the  term  '  rights,'  is 
it  not  ?  "  (Page  93.) 

"It  is." 

"  Well,  then,  summing  up  your  answers,  it  seems  that, 
by  your  hypothesis,  man  entered  the  social  state  volun 
tarily  ;  which  means  that.  h£~£nt  ere  d  it  for  the  sake  of 
obtaining  greater  happiness ;  which  means  that  he  entered 
it  to  obtain  fuller  exercise  of  his  faculties ;  which  means 
that  he  entered  it  to  obtain  security  for  such  exercise ; 
which  means  that  he  entered  it  for  the  guaranteeing  of  his 
'  rights.' " 

"  Put  your  proposition  in  a  more  tangible  form." 

"  Very  good.  If  this  is  to  abstract  a  statement  for  you, 
let  us  attempt  a  simpler  one.  You  say  that  a  state  of 
political  combination  was  preferred  mainly  because  it 
afforded  greater  security  for  life  and  property  than  the 
isolated  state,  do  you  not  ?  " 

"Certainly." 

"  Are  not  a  man's  claims  to  his  life  and  his  property 


ARE  THEY  EVER  SURRENDERED  ?         227 

amongst  what  we  term  his  rights ;  and  moreover,  the  most 
important  of  them  ?  " 

"They  are." 

"  Then  to  say  that  men  formed  themselves  into  com 
munities  to  prevent  the  constant  violation  of  their  claims 
to  life  and  property,  is  to  say  that  they  did  it  for  the  pres 
ervation  of  their  rights  ?  " 

"It  is." 

"  Wherefore,  either  way  we  find  that  the  preservation 
of  rights  was  the  object  sought." 

"  So  it  would  seem." 

"  But  your  hypothesis  is  that  men  give  up  their  rights 
on  entering  the  social  state  ?  " 

"  Yes." 

"  See  now  how  you  contradict  yourself.  You  assert 
that  on  becoming  members  of  a  society,  men  give  up, 
what  by  your  own  showing  they  joined  it  the  better  to 
obtain !  " 

"  Well,  perhaps  I  ought  not  to  have  said  that  they 
'  give  up '  their  rights,  but  that  they  place  them  in 
trust." 

"  In  whose  trust  ?  " 

"  In  that  of  a  government." 

"  A  government,  then,  is  a  kind  of  agent  employed 
by  the  members  of  a  community,  to  take  care  of,  and 
administer  for  their  benefit,  something  given  into  its 
charge  ?  " 

"Exactly." 

"And  of  course,  like  all  other  agents,  exercises 
authority  only  at  the  .  will  of  those  who  appoint  it — 
performs  all  that  it  is  commissioned  to  do  subject  to  their 
approval  ?  " 

"Just  so."    . 

"  And  the  things  committed  to  its  charge  still  belong 
to  the  original  owners.  The  title  of  the  people  to  the 


228  POLITICAL   EIGHTS. 

rights  they  have  placed  in  trust  continues  valid :  the  peo 
ple  may  demand  from  this  agent  the  full  benefit  accruing 
from  these  rights ;  and  may,  if  they  please,  resume  posses 
sion  of  them?" 

"  Not  so." 

"  Not  so !     What,  can  they  not  reclaim  their  own  ?  " 

"  No.  Having  once  consigned  their  rights  into  the 
keeping  of  a  legislature,  they  must  be  content  with  such 
use  of  them  as  that  legislature  permits." 

And  thus  we  arrive  at  the  curious  doctrine  above 
referred  to,  that  the  members  of  a  community  having  en 
trusted  an  estate  (their  rights)  to  the  care  of  a  steward 
(their  government),  thereby  lose  all  proprietorship  in  such 
estate,  and  can  have  no  benefit  from  it,  except  what  their 
steward  pleases  to  vouchsafe ! 

§  6.     But  it  is  needless  to  assault  this  theory  of  gov 
ernment-omnipotence  from  without,  for  it  is  betrayed  from 
within.     It  is  self-destructive.     It  is  disproved  by  its  own 
innermost  principle.      The  very  witness  called  to  testify 
of  its  truth  lets  out  its  falsity.     For  to  what  end  is  this 
attempted  denial  of  rights  ?     It  is  to  the  end  of  establish- 
i    ing  the  law  of  the  greatest  happiness  to  the  greatest  num- 
I   ber — a  law  to  carry  out  which  government  is  said  to  exist 
I   — a  law  by  whose  dictates  alone  government  ought  to  be 
I  guided — a  law,  therefore,  of  higher  authority  than  govern- 
\  men  I*  BBTIWedenl ,lo  it — a  law  to  which  government  must 
Vbe  subservient,  subordinate.     But  what,  when  scrutinized, 
noes  this  law  of  the  greatest  happiness  to  the  greatest 
lumber  resolve  itself  into  ?     Why,  into  the  ultra-demo 
cratic  dogma — all  men    have  equal  rights  to  happiness 
(p.  34).     Wherefore  it  is   to  carry  out  the  law — all  men 
have  equal  rights  to  happiness,  that  government  exists. 
And  thus,  even  according  to  the  opposition  hypothesis, 
rights  are  the  be-all  and  end-all  of  government ;  and  rank 
above  it,  as  the  end  above  the  means. 


THE    INDIVIDUAL    AGAINST   THE    STATE.  229 


CHAPTER   XIX. 

THE  EIGHT  TO  IGNOEE  THE  STATE. 

§  1.  As  a  corollary  to  the  proposition  that  all  insti 
tutions  must  be  subordinated  to  .the  law  of  equal  freedom, 
we  cannot  choose  but  admit  the  right  of  the  citizen  to  adopt 
a  condition  of  voluntary  outlawry.  If  every  man  has  free 
dom  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes  not  the 
equal  freedom  of  any  other  man,  than  he  is  free  to  drop 
connection  with  the  state — to  relinquish  its  protection,  and 
to  refuse  paying  toward  its  support.  It  is  self-evident 
that  in  so  behaving  he  in  no  way  trenches  upon  the  liberty 
of  others ;  for  his  position  is  a  passive  one ;  and  whilst 
passive  he  cannot  become  an  aggressor.  It  is  equally  self- 
evident  that  he  cannot  be  compelled  to  continue  one  of  a 
political  corporation,  without  a  breach  of  the  moral  law, 
seeing  that  citizenship  involves  payment  of  taxes ;  and  the 
taking  away  of  a  man's  property  against  his  will,  is  an  in 
fringement  of  his  rights  (p.  153).  Government  being 
simply  an  agent  employ  in  common  by  a  number  of  indi 
viduals  to  secure  to  them  certain  advantages,  the  very 
nature  of  the  connection  implies  that  it  is  for  each  to  say 
whether  he  will  employ  such  an  agent  or  not.  If  any  one 
of  them  determines  to  ignore  this  mutual-safety  confedera 
tion,  nothing  can  be  said  except  that  he  loses  all  claim  to 
its  good  offices,  and  exposes  himself  to  the  danger  of  mal 
treatment — a  thing  he  is  quite  at  liberty  to  do  if  he  likes. 
He  cannot  be  coerced  into  political  combination  without  a 
breach  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom ;  he  can  withdraw  from 
it  without  committing  any  such  breach ;  and  he  has  there 
fore  a  right  so  to  withdraw. 

§   2.     "  No  human  laws  are  of  any  validity  if  con- 


230        THE  EIGHT  TO  IGNORE  THE  STATE. 

trary  to  the  law  of  nature  ;  and  such  of  them  as  are  valid 
derive  all  their  force  and  all  their  authority  mediately  or 
immediately  from  this  original."  Thus  writes  Blackstone, 
to  whom  let  all  honour  be  given  for  having  so  far  outseen 
the  ideas  of  his  time  ;  and,  indeed,  we  may  say  of  our 
time.  A  good  antidote,  this,  for  those  political  supersti- 
tions  which  so  widely  prevail.  A  good  check  upon  that 
sentiment  of  power-  worship  which  still  misleads  us  by 
magnifying  the  prerogatives  of  constitutional  governments 
~Sas  it  once  did  those  of  monarchs.  Let  men  learn  that  a 
q  not  "  our  God  upon  earth,"  though,  by  the 


.authority  they  ascribe  to  it,  and  the  things  they  expect 
f    v  from  it,  they  would  seem  to  think  it  is.     Let  them  learn 

^    3L  rather  that  it  is  an  institution  serving  a  purely  temporary 

J^§T    purpose,  whose   power,  when   not   stolen,  is  at  the  best 
i    borrowed. 

f*!N"ay,  indeed,  have  we  not  seen  (p.  24)  that  government 
/  is  essentially  immoral  ?    Is  it  not  the  offspring  of  evil, 

v  bearing  about  it  all  the  marks  of  its  parentage  ?  Does  it 
not  exist  because  crime  exists  ?  Is  it  not  strong,  or  as  we 
say,  despotic,  when  crime  is  great  ?  Is  there  not  more 
liberty,  that  is,  less  government,  as  crime  diminishes? 
•fAnd  must  not  government  cease  when  crime  ceases,  for 

S  very  lack  of  objects  on  which  to  perform  its  function? 

Sot  only  does  magisterial  power  exist  because  of  evil,  but 
it  exists  by  evil.  Violence  is  employed  to  maintain  it  ; 
and  all  violence  involves  criminality.  Soldiers,  policemen, 
and  gaolers  ;  swords,  batons,  and  fetters,  are  instruments 
for  inflicting  pain;  and  all  infliction  of  pain  is  in  the 
abstract  wrong.  The  state  employs  evil  weapons  to  sub 
jugate  evil,  and  is  alike  contaminated  by  the  objects  with 

^  which  it  deals,  and  the  means  by  which  it  works.     Moral 

ity  cannot  recognize  it  ;  for  morality,  being  simply  a 
statement  of  the  perfect  law  can  give  no  countenance 
to  any  thing  growing  out  of,  and  living  by,  breaches  of 


ITS   EVIL   ORIGIN  AND  NATURE.  231 

that  law  (Chap.  I.).  "Wherefore,  legislative  authority 
can  never  be  ethical — must  always  be  conventional 
merely. 

Hence,  there  is  a  certain  inconsistency  in  the  attempt 
to  determine  the  right  position,  structure,  and  conduct  of 
a  government  by  appeal  to  the  first  principles  of  rectitude. 
For,  as  just  pointed  out,  the  acts  of  an  institution  which 
is  in  both  nature  and  origin  imperfect,  cannot  be  made  to 
square  with  the  perfect  law.  All  that  we  can  do  is  to  afr 


certain  Jfirstly,  injwjiajyrtjbitujie^^  to 

the  community  to  avoid  being  by  its  mere  existence  an 
embodied  wrong  ;-4-secondly,  in  what  manner  it  must  be 
constituted  so  as  to  exhibit  the  least  incongruity  with  the 
moral  law  ; — andj^hirdly,  tojwhat  sphere  its  actions  must 
be  limited  to  prevent  it  from  multiplying  those  breaches 
of  equity  it  is  set  up  to  prevent. 

The  first  condition  to  be  conformed  to  before  a  legisla 
ture  can  be  established  without  violating  the  law  of  equal 
freedom,  is  the  acknowledgment  of  the  right  now  under 
discussion — the  right  to  ignore  the  state.* 

§  3.  Upholders  of  pure  despotism  may  fitly  believe 
state-control  to  be  unlimited  and  unconditional.  They 
who  assert  that  men  are  made  for  governments  and  not 
governments  for  men,  may  consistently  hold  that  no  one 
can  remove  himself  beyond  the  pale  of  political  organiza 
tion.  But  they  who  maintain  that  the  people  are  the  only 
legitimate  source  of  power — that  legislative  authority 
is  not  original,  but  deputed — cannot  deny  the  right  to 
ignore  the  state  without  entangling  themselves  in  an 
absurdity. 

For,  if  legislative  authority  is  deputed,  it  follows  that 

*  Hence  may  be  drawn  an  argument  for  direct  taxation ;  seeing  that 
only  when  taxation  is  direct  does  repudiation  of  state  burdens  become 
possible. 


232  THE   EIGHT   TO   IGNORE   THE   STATE. 

those  from  whom  it  proceeds  are  the  masters  of  those  on 
whom  it  is  conferred :  it  follows  further,  that  as  masters 
they  confer  the  said  authority  voluntarily :  and  this  im 
plies  that  they  may  give  or  withhold  it  as  they  please.  To 
call  that  deputed  which  is  wrenched  from  men  whether 
they  will  or  not,  is  nonsense.  But  what  is  here  true  of  all 
collectively  is  equally  true  of  each  separately.  As  a  gov 
ernment  can  rightly  act  for  the  people,  only  when  empow 
ered  by  them,  so  also  can  it  rightly  act  for  the  individual, 
only  when  empowered  by  him.  If  A,  B,  and  C,  debate 
whether  they  shall  employ  an  agent  to  perform  for  them 
a  certain  service,  and  if  whilst  A  and  B  agree  to  do  so,  C 
dissents,  C  cannot  equitably  be  made  a  party  to  the  agree 
ment  in  spite  of  himself.  And  this  must  be  equally  true 
of  thirty  as  of  three :  and  if  of  thirty,  why  not  of  three 
hundred,  or  three  thousand,  or  three  millions  ? 

§  4.  Of  the  political  superstitions  lately  alluded  to, 
none  is  so  universally  diffused  as  the  notion  that  majori 
ties  are  omnipotent.  Under  the  impression  that  the  pres 
ervation  of  order  will  ever  require  power  to  be  wielded 
by  some  party,  the  moral  sense  of  our  time  feels  that  such 
power  cannot  rightly  be  conferred  on  any  but  the  largest 
moiety  of  society.  It  interprets  literally  the  saying  that 
"  the  voice  of  the  people  is  the  voice  of  God,"  and  trans 
ferring  to  the  one  the  sacredness  attached  to  the  other, 
it  concludes  that  from  the  will  of  the  people,  that  is  of  the 
majority,  there  can  be  no  appeal.  Yet  is  this  belief  en 
tirely  erroneous. 

Suppose,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that,  struck  by  some 
Malthusian  panic,  a  legislature  duly  representing  public 
opinion  were  to  enact  that  all  children  born  during  the 
next  ten  years  should  be  drowned.  Does  any  one  think 
such  an  enactment  would  be  warrantable  ?  If  not,  there 
is  evidently  a  limit  to  the  power  of  a  majority.  Suppose, 


I  ml- 

SUEOEDINATION   OF   GOVERNMENT   AUTHORITY.        233 

again,  that  of  two  races  living  together — Celts  and  Saxons, 
for  example — the  most  numerous  determined  to  make  the 
others  their  slaves.  Would  the  authority  of  the  greatest 
number  be  in  such  case  valid  ?  If  not,  there  is  something 
to  which  its  authority  must  be  subordinate.  Suppose, 
once  more,  that  all  men  having  incomes  under  £50  a  year 
were  to  resolve  upon  reducing  every  income  above  that 
amount  to  their  own  standard,  and  appropriating  the  ex 
cess  for  public  purposes.  Could  their  resolution  be  justi 
fied  ?  If  not,  it  must  be  a  third  time  confessed  that  there 
is  a  law  to  which  the  popular  voice  must  defer.  What, 
then,  is  that  law,  if  not  the  law  of  pure  equity — the  law 
of  equal  freedom  ?  These  restraints,  which  all  would  put 
to  the  will  of  the  majority,  are  exactly  the  restraints  set 
up  by  that  law.  We  deny  the  right  of  a  majority  to 
murder,  to  enslave,  or  to  rob,  simply  because  murder,  en 
slaving,  and  robbery  are  violations  of  that  law — viola 
tions  too  gross  to  be  overlooked.  But  if  great  violations 
of  it  are  wrong,  so  also  are  smaller  ones.  If  the  will  of 
the  many  cannot  supersede  the  first  principle  of  morality 
in  these  cases,  neither  can  it  in  any.  So  that,  however 
insignificant  the  minority,  and  however  trifling  the  pro 
posed  trespass  against  their  rights,  no  such  trespass  is  per 
missible. 

/     When  we  have  made  our  constitution  purely  demo- 

/cratic,  thinks  to  himself  the  earnest  reformer,  we  shall 

j:  have  brought  government  into  harmony  with   absolute 

justice.     Such  a  faith,  though  perhaps  needful  for  the  age, 

is  a  very  erroneous  one.     By  no  process  can  coercion  be 

made  equitable.     The  freest  form  of  government  is  only 

the  least  objectional  form.     The  rule  of  the  many  by  the 

few  we  call  tyranny :  the  rule  of  the  few  by  the  many  is 

/tyranny  also ;  only  of  a  less  intense  kind.     "  You  shall  do 

I  as  we  will,  and  not  as  you  will,"  is  in  either  case  the 

^  declaration ;  and  if  the  hundred  make  it  to  the  ninety- 


\ 


234        THE  EIGHT  TO  IGNOEE  THE  STATE. 

nine,  instead  of  the  ninety-nine  to  the  hundred,  it  is  only 
a  fraction  less  immoral.  Of  two  such  parties,  whichever 
fulfils  this  declaration  necessarily  breaks  the  law  of 
equal  freedom :  the  only  difference  being  that  by  the  one 
it  is  broken  in  the  persons  of  ninety-nine,  whilst  by 
the  other  it  is  broken  in  the  persons  of  a  hundred.  And 
the  merit  of  the  democratic  form  of  government  con 
sists  solely  in  this,  that  it  trespasses  against  the  smallest 
number. 

The  very  existence  of  majorities  and  minorities  is  indi- 
;.cative  of  an  immoral  state.  The  man  whose  character 
harmonizes  with  the  moral  law,  we  found  to  be  one  who 
I  can  obtain  complete  happiness  without  diminishing  the 
i  happiness  of  his  fellows  (Chap.  III.).  But  the  enactment 
of  public  arrangements  by  vote  implies  a  society  consist 
ing  of  men  otherwise  constituted — implies  that  the  desires 
of  some  cannot  be  satisfied  without  sacrificing  the  desires 
of  others — implies  that  in  the  pursuit  of  their  happiness 
the  majority  inflict  a  certain  amount  of  imhappiness  on  the 
minority — implies,  therefore,  organic  immorality.  Thus, 
from  another  point  of  view,  we  again  perceive  that  even 
in  its  most  equitable  form  it  is  impossible  for  government 
to  dissociate  itself  from  evil;  and  further,  that  unless  the 
right  to  ignore  the  state  is  recognized,  its  acts  must  be 
essentially  criminal. 

•  §  5.  That  a  man  is  free  to  abandon  the  benefits  and 
throw  off  the  burdens  of  citizenship,  may  indeed  be  inferred 
from  the  admissions  of  existing  authorities  and  of  current 
opinion.  Unprepared  as  they  probably  are  for  so  extreme 
a  doctrine  as  the  one  here  maintained,  the  radicals  of  our 
day  yet  unwittingly  profess  their  belief  in  a  maxim  which 
obviously  embodies  this  doctrine.  Do  we  not  continually 
hear  them  quote  Blackstone's  assertion  that  "  no  subject 
of  England  can  be  constrained  to  pay  any  aids  or  taxes 


BLACK6TONE    ON   THE   LIMIT   OF   TAXATION.  235 

even  for  the  defence  of  the  realm  or  the  support  of  govern 
ment,  but  such  as  are  imposed  by  his  own  consent,  or  that 
of  his  representative  in  parliament  ?  "  And  what  does 
this  mean  ?  It  means,  say  they,  that  every  man  should 
have  a  vote.  True :  but  it  means  much  more.  If  there  is 
any  sense  in  words  it  is  a  distinct  enunciation  of  the  very 
right  now  contended  for.  In  affirming  that  a  man  may 
not  bejbaxed  unless  he  lias  directly  or  indirectly  given  his 
consent,  it  affirms  that  he  mav  refuse  to  be  so  taxed  ;  and 
to  refuse^  to  be  taxed,  is  to  cut  all  connection  with  the 
state. ....  Perhaps  it  will  be  said  that  this  consent  is  not  a 
specific,  but  a  general  one,  and  that  the  citizen  is  under 
stood  to  have  assented  to  every  thing  his  representative 
may  do,  when  he  voted  for  him.  But  suppose  he  did  not 
vote  for  him ;  and  on  the  contrary  did  all  in  his  power  to 
get  elected  some  one  holding  opposite  views — what  then  ? 
The  reply  will  probably  be  that,  by  taking  part  in  such 
an  election,  he  tacitly  agreed  to  abide  by  the  decision  of 
the  majority.  And  how  if  he  did  not  vote  at  all  ?  Why 
then  he  cannot  justly  complain  of  any  tax,  seeing  that  he 
made  no  protest  against  its  imposition.  So,  curiously 
enough,  it  seems  that  he  gave  his  consent  in  whatever  way 
he  acted — whether  he  said  yes,  whether  he  said  no,  or 
whether  he  remained  neuter !  A  rather  awkward  doc 
trine  this.  Here  stands  an  unfortunate  citizen  who  is 
asked  if  he  will  pay  money  for  a  certain  proffered  advan 
tage  ;  and  whether  he  employs  the  only  means  of  express 
ing  his  refusal  or  does  not  employ  it,  we  are  told  that  he 
practically  agrees ;  if  only  the  number  of  others  who  agree 
is  greater  than  the  number  of  those  who  dissent.  And 
thus  we  are  introduced  to  the  novel  principle  that  A's  con 
sent  to  a  thing  is  not  determined  by  what  A  says,  but  by 
what  B  may  happen  to  say ! 

It  is  for  those  who  quote  Blackstone  to  choose  between 
this  absurdity  and  the  doctrine  above  set  forth.     Either 


236        THE  EIGHT  TO  IGNORE  THE  STATE. 

his  maxim  implies  the ;  Tight  to  ignore,  the  state,  or  it  is 
sheer  nonsense. 

§  6.  There  is  a  gjrjjigejheterogeneity  in  our  politi 
cal  faiths.  Systems  that  have  had  their  day,  and  are 
beginning  here  and  there  to  let  the  daylight  through,  are 
patched  with  modern  notions  utterly  unlike  in  quality  and 
colour;  and  men  gravely  display  these  systems,  wear 
them,  and  walk  about  in  them,  quite  unconscious  of  their 
grotesqueness.  This  transition  state  of  ours,  partaking  as 
it  does  equally  of  the  past  and  the  future,  breeds  hybrid 
theories  exhibiting  the  oddest  union  of  bygone  despotism 
and  coming  freedom.  Here  are  types  of  the  old  organiza 
tion  curiously  disguised  by  germs  of  the  new — peculiari 
ties  showing  adaptation  to  a  preceding  state  modified  by 
rudiments  that  prophesy  of  something  to  come — making 
altogether  so  chaotic  a  mixture  of  relationships  that  there 
is  no  saying  to  what  class  these  births  of  the  age  should 
be  referred. 

As  ideas  must  of  necessity  bear  the  stamp  of  the  time, 
it  is  useless  to  lament  the  contentment  with  which  these 
incongruous  beliefs  are  held.  Otherwise  it  would  seem 
unfortunate  that  men  do  not  pursue  to  the  end  the  trains 
of  reasoning  which  have  led  to  these  partial  modifications. 
In  the  present  case,  for  example,  consistency  would  force 
them  to  admit  that,  on  other  points  besides  the  one  just 
noticed,  they  hold  opinions  and  use  arguments  in  which 
the  right  to  ignore^the  state  is  involved. 

For  what  is  the  meaning  of  Dissent  ?  The  time  was 
when  a  man's  faith  and  his  mode  of  worship  were  as  much 
determinable  by  law  as  his  secular  acts ;  and,  according 
to  provisions  extant  in  our  statute-book,  are  so  still. 
Thanks  to  the  growth  of  a  Protestant  spirit,  however,  we 
have  ignored  the  state  in  this  matter — wholly  in  theory, 
and  partly  in  practice.  But  how  have  we  done  so  ?  By 


REPUDIATION   OF    STATE   RELIGION.  237 

assuming  an  attitude  which,  if  consistently  maintained, 
implies  a  right  to  ignore  the  state  entirely.  Observe  the 
positions  of  the  two  parties.  "  This  is  your  creed,"  says 
the  legislator ;  "  you  must  believe  and  openly  profess  what 
is  here  set  down  for  you."  "  I  shall  not  do  any  thing  of 
the  kind,"  answers  the  nonconformist ;  "  I  will  go  to  prison 
rather."  "  Your  religious  ordinances,"  pursues  the  legis 
lator,  "  shall  be  such  as  we  have  prescribed.  You  shall 
attend  the  churches  we  have  endowed,  and  adopt  the  cer 
emonies  used  in  them."  "  Nothing  shall  induce  me  to  do 
so,"  is  the  reply ;  "  I  altogether  deny  your  power  to  dic 
tate  to  me  in  such  matters,  and  mean  to  resist  to  the  utter 
most."  "  Lastly,"  adds  the  legislator,  "  we  shall  require 
you  to  pay  such  sums  of  money  toward  the  support  of 
these  religious  institutions,  as  we  may  see  fit  to  ask." 
"  Not  a  farthing  will  you  have  from  me,"  exclaims  our 
sturdy  Independent :  "  even  did  I  believe  in  the  doctrines 
of  your  church  (which  I  do  not),  I  should  still  rebel 
against  your  interference  ;  and  if  you  take  my  property, 
it  shall  be  by  force  and  under  protest." 

What  now  does  this  proceeding  amount  to  when  re 
garded  in  the  abstract  ?  It  amounts  to  an  assertion  by 
the  individual  of  the  right  to  exercise  one  of  his  faculties — 
the  religious  sentiment — without  let  or  hindrance,  and 
with  no  limit  save  that  set  up  by  the  equal  claims  of  oth 
ers.  And  what  is  meant  by  ignoring  the  state  ?  Simply 
an  assertion  of  the  right  similarly  to  exercise  all  the  facul 
ties.  The  one  is  just  an  expansion  of  the  other — rests  on 
the  same  footing  with  the  other — must  stand  or  fall  with 
the  other.  Men  do  indeed  speak  of  civil  and  religious 
liberty  as  different  things :  but  the  distinction  is  quite  ar 
bitrary.  They  are  parts  of  the  same  whole  and  cannot 
philosophically  be  separated. 

"  Yes  they  can,"  interposes  an  objector ;  "  assertion  of 
the  one  is  imperative  as  being  a  religious  duty.  The  lib- 


238        THE  EIGHT  TO  IGNORE  THE  STATE. 

erty  to  worship  God  in  the  way  that  seems  to  him  right, 
is  a  liberty  without  which  a  man  cannot  fulfil  what  he  be 
lieves  to  be  Divine  commands,  and  therefore  conscience 
requires  him  to  maintain  it."  True  enough  ;  but  how  if 
the  same  can  be  asserted  of  all  other  liberty  ?  How  if 
maintenance  of  this  also*  turns  out  to  be  a  matter  of  con 
science  ?  Have  we  not  seen  that  human  happiness  is  the 
Divine  will  —  that  only  by  exercising  our  faculties  is  this 
happiness  obtainable  —  and  that  it  is  impossible  to  exercise 
them  without  freedom  ?  (Chap.  IV.)  And  if  this  freedom 
for  the  exercise  of  faculties  is  a  condition"  without  which 
the  Divine  will  cannot  be  fulfilled,  the  preservation  of  it 
is,  by  our  objector's  own  showing,  a  duty.  Or,  in  other 
words,  it  appears  not  only  that  the  maintenance  of  liberty 
of  action  may  be  a  point  of  conscience,  but  that  it  ought 
to  be  one.  And  thus  we  are  clearly  shown  that  the  claims 
to  ignore  the  state  in  rebV'^ff  M»r}  fa  fuffiylar  nnfl.ttftrs  are 
identical! 


The  other  reason  commonly  assigned  for  nonconform 
ity,  admits  of  similar  treatment.  Besides  resisting  state 
dictation  in  the  abstract,  the  dissenter  resists  it  from  dis 
approbation  of  the  doctrines  taught.  No  legislative  in 
junction  will  make  him  adopt  what  he  considers  an  erro 
neous  belief;  and,  bearing  in  mind  his  duty  toward  his 
fellow-men,  he  refuses  to  help  through  the^  medium  of  his 
purse  in  disseminating  this  erroneous  belief.  The  position 
is  perfectly  intelligible.  But  it  is  one  which  either  com 
mits  its  adherents  to  civil  nonconformity  also,  or  leaves 
them  in  a  dilemma.  For  why  do  they  refuse  to  be  instru 
mental  in  spreading  error  ?  Because  error  is  adverse  to 
human  happiness.  And  on  what  ground  is  any  piece  of 
secular  legislation  disapproved  ?  For  the  same  reason  — 
because  thought  adverse  to  human  happiness.  How  then 
can  it  be  shown  that  the  state  ought  to  be  resisted  in  the 
one  case  and  not  in  the  other  ?  Will  any  one  deliberately 


NONCONFORMITY   IN    CIVIL   AFFAIRS.  239 

assert  that  if  a  government  demands  money  from  us  to 
aid  in  teaching  what  we  think  will  produce  evil,  we  ought 
to  refuse  it ;  but  that  if  the  money  is  for  the  purpose  of 
doing  what  we  think  will  produce  evil,  we  ought  not  to 
refuse  it?  Yet,  such  is  the  hopeful  proposition  which 
those  have  to  maintain  who  recognize  the  right  to  ignore 
the  state  in  religious  matters,  but  deny  it  in  civil  matters. 

§  7.  The  substance  of  this  chapter  once  more  re 
minds  us  of  the  incongruity  between  a  perfect  law  and  an 
imperfect  state.  The  practicability  of  the  principle  here 
laid  down  varies  directly  as  social  morality. "  In  a  thor 
oughly  vicious  community  its  admission  would  be  pro 
ductive  of  anarchy.  In  a  completely  virtuous  one  its  ad 
mission  will  be  both  innocuous  and  inevitable.  Progress 
toward  a  condition  of  social  health — a  condition,  that  is, 
in  which  the  remedial  measures  of  legislation  will  no 
longer  be  needed,  is  progress  toward  a  condition  in  which 
those  remedial  measures  will  be  cast  aside,  and  the  author 
ity  prescribing  them  disregarded.  The  two  changes  are 
of  necessity  coordinate.  That  moral  sense  whose  suprem- 
acy  will  make  society  harmonious  and  government  unne 
cessary,  is  the  same  moral  sense  which  will  then  make 
each  man  assert  his  freedom  even  to  the  extent  of  ignoring 
the  state — is_jthe  same  moral  sense  which,  by  deterring  the 
majority  from  ^q^Qtcing  the  minority,  will  eventually 
render  government  impossible.  And  as  what  are  merely 
different  manifestations  of  the  same  sentiment  must  bear 
a  constant  ratio  to  each  other,  the  tendency  to  repu 
governments  will  increase  only  at  the  same  rate  that  gov 
ernments  become  needless. 

"  "Eel  not  any  be  alarmed,  therefore,  at  the  promulgation 
of  the  foregoing  doctrine.  There  are  many  changes  yet 
to  be  passed  through  before  it  can  begin  to  exercise  much 
influence.  <  Probably  a  long  ..lime.  wILL.elapse  before  the 


240  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE    STATE. 

right  to  ignore  the  state  will  be  generally  admitted,  even 
in  theory/  ?  It  will  be  still  longer  before  it  receives  legis 
lative  recognition.  And  even  then  £here  will  be  plenty 
of  checks  upon  the  premature  exercise  of  it.  A  sharp  ex 
perience  will  sufficiently  instruct  those  who  may  too  soon 
abandon  legal  protection.  Whilst,  in  the  majority  of  men, 
there  is  such  a  love  of  tried  arrangements,  and  so  great  a 
dread  of  experiments,  that  they  will  probably  not  act 
upon  this  right  until  long  after  it  is  safe  to  do  so. 


£W&  Sfc^  ft*-**- f 


CHAPTER    XX. 

THE    CONSTITUTION    OF   THE    STATE.* 

§    1.  i-Of  the  several  conclusions  deducible  from  the 

law  of  equal  freedom  there  are  few  more  manifest  or  more 

generally  agreed  to  than  this,  that  all  members  of  a  com- 

Y  munity  have  like  claims  to  political  power,  /(if  every  man 

has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills,  provided  he  infringes 

not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other  man,  then  each  is  free 

to  exercise  the  same  authority  in  legislation  as  his  fellows  ; 

and  no  individual  or  class  can  exercise  greater  authority 

than  the  rest  without  violating  the  law.  > 

Evidently,  therefore,  a  purely  democratic  government 
is  the  only  one  which  is  morally  admissible  —  is  the  only 
one  that  is  not  ija^nsicaljjjcjmnjinal.  As  lately  shown, 
no  government  can  have  any  ethical  authority.  The  high 
est  form  it  can  assume  is  that  in  which  the  moral  law  re- 

*  The  immediate  interest  of  the  subject  will  sufficiently  explain  the 
length  to  which  this  chapter  is  extended  ;  and  if  the  style  of  argument  used 
in  it  is  somewhat  too  popular  for  a  work  like  the  present,  the  same  consid 
eration  must  serve  as  an  excuse.  Two  of  the  sections  have  already  ap 
peared  in  print. 


, 

THE   INSATIATE   LUST   OF   POWEK.  241 


mains  passiT£j^j^^.Q^axd  to  it  —  tolera^js^it  —  no  Jonger 
protests  against  it.    JThe  first  condition  of  that  form  is 
that  citizenship  Tfoal^h 
shall  confer  equal  privileges. 
^>L-j  l^i~  C*   l 

§  2.  It  is  a  tolerably  well-ascertained  fact  that  men 
are  still  selfish.  And  that  beings  answering  to  this  epi 
thet  will  employ  the  power  placed  in  their  hands  for  their 
own  advantage  is  self-evident.  Directly  or  indirectly, 
either  by  hook  or  by  crook,  if  not  openly,  then  in  secret, 
their  private  ends  will  be  served.  Granting  the  proposi 
tion  that  men  are  selfish,  we  cannot  avoid  the  corollary, 
that  those  jghojaoaafiss  authority  wi1]a  j^j^mpit.t.p.fL  use  it- 
for  selfish  purposes. 

Should  any  one  need  facts  in  proof  of  this,  he  may 
find  them  at  every  page  in  the  nearest  volume  of  history. 
Under  the  head  —  Monarchy,  he  will  read  of  insatiable 
cravings  after  more  territory  ;  of  confiscations  of  the  sub 
jects'  property  ;  of  justice  sold  to  the  highest  bidder  ;  of 
continued  debasements  of  coinage  ;  and  of  a  greediness 
which  could  even  descend  to  share  the  gains  of  prostitutes. 

He  will  find  Feudalism  exemplifying  the  same  spirit 
by  the  cruelties  inflicted  upon  serfs  ;  by  the  right  of  pri 
vate  war  ;  by  the  predatory  incursions  of  borderers  ;  by 
robberies  practised  on  Jews  ;  and  by  the  extortionate 
tribute  wrung  from  burghers  —  all  of  them  illustrations  of 
that  motto,  so  characteristic  of  the  system,  "  Thou  shalt 
want  ere  I  want." 

Does  he  seek  like  evidence  in  the  conduct  of  later  aris 
tocracies  ?  He  may  discover  it  in  every  state  in  Europe  : 
in  Spain,  where  the  lands  of  nobles  and  clergy  were  long 
exempted  from  direct  taxation  ;  in  Hungary,  where,  until 
lately,  men  of  rank  were  free  of  all  turnpikes,  and  only 
the  mercantile  and  working  classes  paid  ;  in  France,  be 
fore  the  first  revolution,  where  the  tiers-ctat  had  to  bear 
11 


242  THE    CONSTITUTION   OF   THE    STATE. 

all  the  state  burdens ;  in  Scotland,  where  less  than  two 
centuries  ago  it  was  the  custom  of  lairds  to  kidnap  the 
common  people,  and  export  them  as  slaves ;  in  Ireland, 
where  at  the  rebellion  a  band  of  usurping  landowners 
hunted  and  shot  the  Catholics  as  they  would  game,  for 
daring  to  claim  their  own. 

If  more  proofs  are  wanted  that  power  will  be  made 
to  serve  the  purposes  of  its  possessors,  English  legislation 
can  furnish  many  such.  Take,  for  example,  the  signifi 
cantly  named  "  Black  Act"  (9th  of  George  I.),  which  de 
clares  that  any  one  disguised  and  in  possession  of  an  of 
fensive  weapon  "  appearing  in  any  warren,  or  place  where 
hares  or  conies  have  been,  or  shall  be  usually  kept,  and 
being  thereof  duly  convicted,  shall  be  adjudged  guilty  of 
felony,  and  shall  suffer  death,  as  in  cases  of  felony,  with 
out  benefit  of  clergy."  Instance  again  the  Inclosure  Laws, 
by  which  commons  were  divided  amongst  the  neighbour 
ing  landowners,  in  the  ratios  of  their  holdings,  regardless 
of  the  claims  of  the  poor  cottagers.  Notice  also  the  ma- 
noeuvre  by  which  the  land  tax  has  been  kept  stationary, 
or  has  even  decreased,  whilst  other  taxes  have  so  enor 
mously  increased.  Add  to  these  the  private  monopolies 
(obtained  from  the  King  for  "a  consideration"),  the  per 
version  of  the  funds  of  public  schools,  the  manufacture  of 
places,  and  pensions. 

ISTor  is  the  disposition  to  use  power  for  private  ends 
less  manifest  in  our  own  day.  It  shows  itself  in  the  asser 
tion  that  an  electoral  system  should  give  a  preponderance 
to  the  landed  interest.  We  see  it  in  the  legislation  which 
relieves  farmers  from  sundry  assessed  taxes,  that  they  may 
be  enabled  to  pay  more  rent.  It  is  palpably  indicated  in 
the  Game  Laws.  The  conduct  of  the  squire,  who  gets  his 
mansion  rated  at  one-third  of  its  value,  bears  witness  to 
it.  It  appears  in  the  law  enabling  a  landlord  to  antici 
pate  other  creditors,  and  to  obtain  his  rent  by  immediate 


INTENSE    SELFISHNESS    OF   RULEKS.  24:3 

seizure  of  his  tenant's  property.  We  are  reminded  of  it 
by  the  often-mentioned  legacy  and  probate  duties.  It  is 
implied  by  the  fact  that  whilst  no  one  dreams  of  compen 
sating  the  discharged  workman,  gentlemen  sinecurists 
must  have  their  "  vested  interests  "  bought  up  if  their  of 
fices  are  abolished.  In  the  tracts  of  the  Anti-Corn  Law 
League  it  received  abundant  illustration.  It  is  seen  in  the 
votes  of  the  hundred  and  fifty  military  and  naval  mem 
bers  of  Parliament.  And  lastly,  we  find  this  self-seeking 
of  those  in  authority  creeps  out,  even  in  the  doings  of  the 
"  Right  Reverend  Fathers  in  God"  forming  the  Ecclesias 
tical  Commission,  who  have  appropriated,  for  the  embel 
lishment  of  their  own  palaces,  funds  entrusted  to  them  for 
the  benefit  of  the  Church. 

But  it  is  needless  to  accumulate  illustrations.  Though 
every  historian  the  world  has  seen  should  be  subpoenaed 
as  a  witness,  the  fact  could  not  be  rendered  one  whit  more 
certain  than  it  is  already.  Why  ask  whether  those  in 
power  have  sought  their  own  advantage  in  preference  to 
that  of  others  ?  With  human  nature  as  we  know  it,  they 
must  have  done  so.  It  is  this  same  tendency  in  men  to 
pursue  gratification  at  the  expense  of  their  neighbours 
that  renders  government  needful.  Were  we  not  selfish, 
legislative  restraint  would  be  unnecessary.  Evidently, 
then,  the  very  existence  of  a  state-authority  proves  that 
irresponsible  rulers  will  sacrifice  the  public  good  to  their 
personal  benefit ;  all  solemn  promises,  specious  professions, 
and  carefully-arranged  checks  and  safeguards,  notwith 
standing. 

If,  therefore,  class-legislation  is  the    inevitable  conse 
quence  of  class-power,  there  is  no  escape  from  the  conclu-    \/ 
sion  that  the  interest  &£-  the  whole  society  can  be  secured^ 
only  by  giving  power  into  the  hands  of  the  whole  people.  J* 

" 


3.     Against  the  position  that  to  ensure  justice  to 


24:4:  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF  THE   STATE. 

the  nation  at  large  all  its  members  must  be  endowed  with 
like  powers,  it  is  indeed  urged  that,  as  the  working  classes 
constitute  the  majority,  to  endow  all  with  like  powers,  is 
practically  to  make  the  working  classes  supreme.  And  it 
will  probably  be  added  that  by  virtue  of  this /same  self- 
seeking  tendency  just  insisted  upon/legislation  in  their 
hands  would  inevitably  be  twisted  to  serve  the  ends  of 

i  labour  regardless  of  the  claims  of  property., -' 

2jOf  course  those  who  raise  this  objection  do  not  wish 
to  insinuate  that  the  people  would  use  their  power  after 
the  fashion  of  brigands.  Although  in  the  old  Norman 
day,  w7hen  the  sacking  and  burning  of  towns  by  neigh 
bouring  nobles  was  not  unfrequent,  a  change  to  popular 
rule  involved  retaliatory  attacks  upon  the  strongholds  of 
these  feudal  buccaneers,  yet  we  may  fairly  conclude  that 
the  increased  social  morality  which  deters  modern  aristoc 
racies  from  direct  robbery  of  the  people,  would  also  pre 
vent  the  people  from  inflicting  any  direct  injury  upon 
them.  The  danger  this  objection  points  to — the  only  dan 
ger  to  be  rationally  feared — is  that  the  same  insensible 
bias  by  which  our  present  rulers  are  swayed,  would  lead 
the  working  classes  to  sacrifice  the  rights  of  the  rich  on 
the  altar  of  their  own  desires — would  give  rise  to. a  code 
of  laws  favouring  poverty  at  the  expense  of  wealth/ 
I  ,„,-  Even  were  there  no  answer  to  this,  the  evidence  would 
still  preponderate  in  favour  of  popular  enfranchisement. 

f  For  what  at  the  utmost  does  the  argument  amount  to? 
Just  this  i  that  the  few  must  continue  to  trespass  against 

tthe  many,  lest  the  many  should  trespass  against  the  few. 
The  well  fed,  the  luxuriously  housed  and  clothed,  the 
placemen  and  pensioners,  may  perhaps  think  it  better  that 
the  masses  should  suffer  for  their  benefit  (as  they  do)  than 
that  they  should  suffer  for  the  benefit  of  the  masses  (as 
they  might).  But. would  a  just  arbitrator  say  this? 
Would  he  not  say,  on  the  contrary,  that  even  if  their  re- 


DIFFICULTY   OF   COOPEEATION.  245 

spective  members  were  blessed  with  equal  advantages,  the 
minority  ought  to  be  sacrificed  rather  than  the  majority ; 
but  that  as  the  most  numerous  are  at  the  same  time  the 
least  favoured,  their  claim  becomes  still  more  imperative. 
Surely,  if  one  of  the  two  parties  must  submit  to  injustice, 
it  ought  to  be  the  rich  hundreds,  and  not  the  poor  thou- 
sands. 

The  foregoing  objection,  however,  is  not  so  sound  as  it 
looks.  It  is  one  thing  for  a  comparatively  small  cla  ss  to 
unite  in  the  pursuit  of  a  common  advantage,  and  it  is 
another  thing  for  a  dispersed  multitude  to  do  so.  Some 
thousands  of  individuals  having  identical  interests,  mov 
ing  together  in  the  same  circle,  brought  up  with  like  prej 
udices,  educated  in  one  creed,  bound  together  by  family 
ties,  and  meeting  annually  in  the  same  city,  may  easily 
enough  combine  for  the  obtainrnent  of  a  desired  object. 
But  for  half  a  dozen  millions  of  working  men,  distributed 
over  a  vast  area,  engaged  in  various  occupations,  belong 
ing  to  different  religious  sects,  and  divided  into  two  to 
tally  distinct  bodies,  the  one  imbued  with  the  feelings  and 
theories  of  town  life,  the  other  retaining  all  those  preju 
dices  of  the  past  which  yet  linger  in  the  country — for 
these  to  act  with  unanimity  is  scarcely  possible.  Their 
mass  is  too  great,  too  incongruous,  too  scattered,  for  ef 
fective  combination.  /  We  have  current  proof  of  this. 
The  Chartist  agitation  shows  us  men,  who,  during  the  last 
twenty  years,  have  gradually  imbibed  ideas  of  political 
freedom — men  who  have  been  irritated  by  a  sense  of  in 
justice — men  who  have  been  slighted  by  their  fellow-citi 
zens — men  who  have  been  suffering  daily  privations — men, 
therefore,  who  have  had  an  accumulated  stimulus  to  unite 
in  obtaining  what  they  feel  themselves  entitled  to,  and 
what  they  see  reason  to  believe  would  'greatly  benefit 
them.  And  how  have  they  prospered  in  the  attempt  to 
carry  their  point  ?  Disputes,  divisions,  apathy,  adverse 


246  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE    STATE. 

influences  of  every  kind,  have  joined  to  produce  repeated 
failures.  Now  if,  with  the  aid  of  that  enthusiasm  which 
a  righteous  cause  always  inspires,  the  masses  have  not  at 
tained  to  that  unity  of  action  needful  for  the  accomplish 
ment  of  their  object,  much  less  would  they  be  able  suc 
cessfully  to  unite  were  that  object  a  dishonest  one. 

§  4.  Whoever  demurs  to  the  enfranchisement  of  the 
working  men  on  the  ground  that  they  are  immoral,  is 
bound  to  point  out  a  constituency  which  is  not  immoral. 
When  it  is  alleged  thatXthe  venality  of  the  people  renders 
them  unfit  for  the  possession  of  votes^t  is  assumed  ,,'that 
some  class  not  chargeable  with  venality  may  be  found.  " 
But  no  such  class  exists.  Bring  them  all  to  trial  and  not 
a  single  section  of  the  community  would  obtain  a  verdict 
of  "  not  guilty." 

Were  the  shopkeepers  put  upon  their  examination, 
how  would  they  excuse  their  trade  practices  ?  Is  it  moral 
to  put  potatoes  and  alum  in  bread ;  to  add  salt,  tobacco, 
and  colchicum  to  beer ;  to  mix  lard  with  butter ;  to  manu 
facture  milk  in  various  known  and  unknown  ways;  to 
adulterate  oils,  chemicals,  colours,  wines — in  short,  every 
thing  capable  of  adulteration?  Does  the  existence  of  in 
spectors  of  weights  and  measures  indicate  morality  ?  Or 
is  it  honest  to  sell  over  the  counter,  goods  whose  qual 
ity  is  inferior  to  that  of  the  samples  ticketed  in  the  win 
dow  ? 

\  Did  the  manufacturers  make  any  pretension  to  purity, 
they  might  have  to  encounter  some  awkward  hints  as  to 
the  practice  of  tearing  up  old  rags  into  shoddy  to  be 
worked  into  cloth  along  with  new  wool.  Disagreeable 
questions"  might  be  asked  concerning  the  proportion  of 
cotton  woven  into  some  fabrics,  pretended  to  be  wholly 
of  silk.  The  piracy  of  patterns,  too,  would  be  a  delicate 
subject.  And  the  practice  of  using  gypsum  to  increase 


INDICATIONS   OF  GENERAL   SELFISHN 

ttie  weight  and  substance  of  paper,  could  hai 
fended  on  the  principles  of  the  Decalogue. 

Not  less  discreditable  would  be  the  sentence  dese'?Tre4 
by  the  agriculturists.  In  spite  of  the  refining  effects 
which  poets  ascribe  to  intercourse  with  nature,  it  is  nev 
ertheless  an  undoubted  fact  that  the  farmers — in  Dorset 
shire,  at  least — have  been  convicted  of  paying  their  la 
bourers  in  damaged  wheat,  charged  at  the  full  price — a 
habit  not  altogether  conscientious.  It  is  matter  of  his 
tory,  too,  that  before  the  enactment  of  the  New  Poor 
Law,  it  was  in  many  districts  the  custom  to  give  farm 
servants  but  half  wages ;  the  remainder  being  made  up  to 
them  out  of  the  poor-rates,  over  which  their  masters  exer 
cised  the  chief  control.  And  to  these  samples  of  morality 
the  transactions  of  the  cattle-market  and  the  horse-fair 
would  probably  furnish  fit  companions. 

Neither  in  suqh  a  scrutiny  would  the  professions  es 
cape  unscathed,  i  Who  can  hear  the  word  "  venality " 
without  straightway  thinking  of  the  law  ?  Attorneys  al 
ready  stand  in  too  bad  repute  to  need  their  sins  hinting 
at ;  and  even  the  gentlemen  of  the  bar  are  not  without 
reproach.  The  attempt  to  make  a  known  felon  appear  in 
nocent  denotes  rather  confused  ideas  of  right  and  wrong.  '/ 
Then  their  habit  of  taking  fees  to  plead  in  a  cause,  which 
other  engagements  will  not  permit  them,  to  attend,  and 
keeping  the  pay,  although  they  do  not  perform  the  work, 
scarcely  implies  that  honesty  deemed  so  requisite  for  the 
proper  use  of  political  power. 

Our  members  of  Parliament,  too,  were  the  gauntlet 
taken  up  on  their  behalf,  would  come  off  but  indifferently. 
That  arrangement  which  places  them  beyond  the  reach  of 
their  creditors,  is  hardly  consistent  with  the  moral  law ; 
nor  does  it  imply  the  nicest  sense  of  honour.  And  then 
that  disease  of  the  representative  system — bribery;  ought 
the  rich  to  escape  all  the  odium  attaching  to  it — should 
all  the  disgrace  fall  upon  the  poor  electors  ? 


248  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

Nor  can  those  who  move  in  titled  circles  boast  of  su 
perior  integrity.  In  the  trickeries  of  the  turf,  and  in  the 
midnight  scenes  at  gaming-houses,  the  denizens  of  May- 
fair  and  Belgravia  play  a  sufficiently  conspicuous  part. 
The  Huntingtower  bankruptcy  was  not  to  the  credit  of 
the  caste,  any  more  than  are  those  acts  of  outlawry  to 
which,  from  time  to  time,  members  of  it  are  subjected. 
And  did  the  aristocracy  possess  strict  notions  of  equity  it 
is  probable  that  a  little  more  respect  would  be  shown  by 
them  to  the  claims  of  their  tradesmen,  than  is  indicated 
by  their  proverbially  bad  character  as  paymasters. 

Nay,  even  our  highest  officers  of  state  participate  in 
the  general  contamination.  Did  not  the  Mazzini  affair 
show  some  laxity  of  principle  ?  Was  it  nothing,  as  the 
Westminster  Review  put  it,  to  teach  that  theft  is  permis 
sible  when  officials  wish  to  steal  information  from  a  letter — 
\h.2ti*lying  is  permissible  if  they  desire  to  conceal  the  theft 
by  resealing  that  letter — that  forgery  is  permissible  for 
the  purpose  of  counterfeiting  seals  ?  And  then  our  pres 
ent  ministers — are  they  any  better  than  than  their  prede 
cessors  ?  If  so,  how  shall  we  explain  away  the  garbling 
of  some  of  the  West  Indian  despatches,  and  the  suppres 
sion  of  others  ? 

^  No,  no ;  let  not  any  one  oppose  the  enfranchisement 
of  the  people  on  the  score  of  their  immorality,  lest  he  be 
put  to  the  blush  by  the  exposure  of  his  own  offences,  or 
the  offences  of  his  class.  Let  him  that  is  guiltless  cast  the 
first  stone.  Vice,  dishonesty,  venality,  pervade  all  ranks ; 
and  if  political  power  must  be  denied  to  working  men  be 
cause  they  are  corrupt,  it  must  be  denied  to  all  classes 
whatever  for  the  same  reason.  > 

§  5.  Some  indeed  allege  that  the^ masses  i'^ire  more 
vicious  than  the  rest  of  the  community/  But  those  who 
express  this  opinion  arrive  at  it  very  illogically.  They 


CRIMINALITY   OF   THE   WOKKESTG   CLASSES.  24:9 

glance  at  assize  proceedings,  read  through  the  names  and 
occupations  in  the  calendar  of  prisoners,  skim  over  statis 
tics  of  crime,  and  because  they  meet  with  an  immense 
preponderance  of  vagrants,  farm-servants,  bricklayers, 
drovers,  bargemen,  porters,  factory  hands,  and  the  like, 
they  forthwith  set  down  the  peasant  and  artisan  class  as 
greatly  inferior  in  moral  character  to  every  other  class. 
-They  take  no  account  of  the  fact,  that  in  number,  the  la 
bouring  population  is  at  least  six  times  all  the  rest  put  to 
gether.  They  do  not  inquire  whether,  if  the  cases  that 
appear  in  the  police  sheets  of  swindling  advertisers,  of 
false-ticketing  tradesmen,  of  embezzling  clerks,  of  young 
gentlemen  concerned  in  drunken  sprees,  attacks  on  the 
police,  insults  to  women,  and  so  on,  were  multiplied  by 
six,  they  would  not  approach  in  number  the  other  cases 
daily  reported.  Were  this  done,  however — were  the 
crimes  committed  by  each  class  reduced  to  a  percentage 
upon  the  size  of  that  class,  there  would  be  found  much 
less  inequality  than  is  commonly  thought  to  exist. 

Moreover,  it  should  be  remembered  that  the  immoral 
ity  of  the  middle  and  upper  ranks  assumes  a  different 
guise  from  that  worn  by  the  vices  of  the  poor.  Men  com 
paratively  wrell  off  are  riot  likely  to  be  guilty  of  those 
grosser  offences  seen  amongst  the  lower  orders,  for  their 
circumstances  remove  them  almost  beyond  temptation  to 
these.  But  the  bad  propensities  may  and  do  exist  in  full 
force  notwithstanding ;  and  enough  of  their  workings  may 
any  day  be  seen  in  courts  of  law^  Fraudulent  bankrupt 
cies,  actions  for  debt,  suits  for  the  restitution  of  usurped 
rights,  quarrels  about  wills — all  these  show  the  activity 
of  passions  which,  under  other  conditions,  might  have 
produced  acts  technically  called  crimes.  Men  who,  by 
legal  chicanery,  cheat  others  out  of  their  property,  or  who 
refuse  to  discharge  the  claims  justly  made  upon  them  until 
forced  by  law,  are  men  who,  in  a  lower  walk  of  life,  would 
11* 


250  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

have  picked  pockets  or  robbed  hen-roosts.  We  must 
measure  morality  by  motives,  not  by  deeds.  And  if  we 
thus  estimate  the  characters  of  the  trading  and  richer 
grades,  taking  into  account  also  the  consideration  above 
adverted  to — number — we  shall  find  that  the  data  on  the 
strength  of  which  we  attribute  especial  immorality  to  the 
labouring  classes  are  by  no  means  sufficient. 

§  6.  It  is  a  pity  that  those  who  speak  disparagingly 
of  the  masses  have  not  wisdom  enough,  or  candour  enough, 
to  make  due  allowance  for  the  unfavourable  circumstances 
in  which  the  masses  are  placed  Suppose  that  after  care 
fully  weighing  the  evidence  it  should  turn  out  that  the 
working  men  do  exhibit  greater  vices  than  those  more 
comfortably  off;  does  it  therefore  follow  that  they  are 
morally  worse?  Are  the  additional  temptations  under 
which  they  labour  to  be  left  out  of  the  estimate  ?  Shall 
as  much  be  expected  at  their  hands  as  from  those  born 
into  a  more  fortunate  position  ?  Ought  the  same  demands 
to  be  made  upon  the  possessors  of  five  talents  as  upon  the 
possessors  of  ten  ?  Surely  the  lot  of  the  hard-handed  la 
bourer  is  pitiable  enough  without  having  harsh  judgments 
passed  upon  him.  To  be  wholly  sacrificed  to  other  men's 
happiness ;  to  be  made  a  mere  human  tool ;  to  have  every 
faculty  subordinated  to  the  sole  function  of  work — this, 
one  would  say,  is  alone  a  misfortune,  needing  all  sympa 
thy  for  its  mitigation.  Consider  well  these  endowments 
of  his — these  capacities,  affections,  tastes,  and  the  vague 
yearnings  to  which  they  give  birth.  Think  of  him  now 
with  his  caged-up  desires  doomed  to  a  daily,  weekly, 
yearly  round  of  painful  toil,  with  scarcely  any  remission 
but  for  food  and  sleep.  Observe  how  he  is  tantalized  by 
the  pleasures  he  sees  his  richer  brethren  partaking  of,  but 
from  which  he  must  be  forever  debarred.  Note  the  hu 
miliation  he  suffers  from  being  looked  down  upon  as  of  no 


UNJUST  CONDEMNATION  OF  THE  WOEKING  CLASSES.      251 

account  amongst  men.  And  then  remember  that  he  has 
nothing  to  look  forward  to  but  a  monotonous  continuance 
of  this  till  death.  Is  this  a  salutary  state  of  things  to  live 
under  ? 

It  is  very  easy  for  you,  O  respectable  citizen,  seated  in 
your  easy  chair,  with  your  feet  on  the  fender,  to  hold  forth 
on  the  misconduct  of  the  people ; — very  easy  for  you  to 
censure  their  extravagant  and  vicious  habits  ; — very  easy 
for  you  to  be  a  pattern  of  frugality,  of  rectitude,  of  so 
briety.  What  else  should. you  be?  Here  are  you  sur 
rounded  by  comforts,  possessing  multiplied  sources  of  law 
ful  happiness,  with  a  reputation  to  maintain,  an  ambition 
to  fulfil,  and  the  prospect  of  a  competency  for  your  old 
age.  A  shame  indeed  would  it  be  if  with  these  advan 
tages  you  were  not  well  regulated  in  your  behaviour.  You 
have  a  cheerful  home,  are  warmly  and  cleanly  clad,  and 
fare,  if  not  sumptuously  every  day,  at  any  rate  abun 
dantly.  For  your  hours  of  relaxation  there  are  amuse 
ments.  A  newspaper  arrives  regularly  to  satisfy  your  cu 
riosity  ;  if  your  tastes  are  literary,  books  may  be  had  in 
plenty ;  and  there  is  a  piano  if  you  like  music.  You  can 
afford  to  entertain  your  friends,  and  are  entertained  in 
return.  There  are  lectures,  and  concerts,  and  exhibitions, 
accessible  if  you  incline  to  them.  You  may  have  a  holi 
day  when  you  choose  to  take  one,  and  can  spare  money 
for  an  annual  trip  to  the  sea-side.  And  enjoying  all  these 
privileges  you  take  credit  to  yourself  for  being  a  well- 
conducted  man  !  Small  praise  to  you  for  it !  If  you  do 
not  contract  dissipated  habits  where  is  the  merit?  you 
have  few  incentives  to  do  so.  It  is  no  honour  to  you  that 
you  do  not  spend  your  savings  in  sensual  gratification ; 
you  have  pleasures  enough  without.  But  what  would  you 
do  if  placed  in  the  position  of  the  labourer  ?  How  would 
these  virtues  of  yours  stand  the  wear  and  tear  of  poverty  ? 
Where  would  your  prudence  and  self-denial  be  if  you  were 


252  THE    CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

deprived  of  all  the  hopes  that  now  stimulate  you ;  if  you 
had  no  better  prospect  than  that  of  the  Dorsetshire  farm- 
servant  with  his  7$.  a  week,  or  that  of  the  perpetually- 
straitened  stocking- weaver,  or  that  of  the  mill-hand  with 
his  periodical  suspensions  of  work  ?  Let  us  see  you  tied 
to  an  irksome  employment  from  dawn  till  dusk ;  fed  on 
meagre  food,  and  scarcely  enough  of  that ;  married  to  a 
factory  girl  ignorant  of  domestic  management ;  deprived 
of  the  enjoyments  which  education  opens  up;  with  no 
place  of  recreation  but  the  po-t-house,  and  then  let  us  see 
whether  you  would  be  as  steady  as  you  are.  Suppose 
your  savings  had  to  be  made,  not,  as  now,  out  of  surplus 
income,  but  out  of  wages  already  insufficient  for  necessa 
ries  ;  and  then  consider  whether  to  be  provident  would 
be  as  easy  as  you  at  present  find  it.  Conceive  yourself 
one  of  a  despised  class  contemptuously  termed  "  the  great 
unwashed ; "  stigmatized  as  brutish,  stolid,  vicious ;  sus 
pected  of  harbouring  wicked  designs ;  excluded  from  the 
dignity  of  citizenship ;  and  then  say  whether  the  desire 
to  be  respectable  would  be  as  practically  operative  on  you 
as  now.  Lastly,  imagine  that  seeing  your  capacities  were 
but  ordinary,  your  education  next  to  nothing,  and  your 
competitors  innumerable,  you  despaired  of  ever  attaining 
to  a  higher  station ;  and  then  think  whether  the  incentives 
to  perseverance  and  forethought  would  be  as  strong  as 
your  existing  ones.  Realize  these  circumstances,  O  com 
fortable  citizen,  and  then  answer  whether  the  reckless, 
disorderly  habits  of  the  people  are  so  inexcusable. 

How  offensive  is  it  to  hear  some  pert,  self-approving 
personage,  who  thanks  God  that  he  is  not  as  other  men 
are,  passing  harsh  sentence  on  his  poor  hard-worked  hea 
vily-burdened  fellow-countrymen ;  including  them  all  in 
one  sweeping  condemnation,  because  in  their  struggles  for 
existence  they  do  not  maintain  the  same  prim  respectabil 
ity  as  himself.  Of  all  stupidities  there  are  few  greater, 


FALSE  JUDGMENT  OF  CONDUCT.          253 

and  yet  few  in  which  we  more  doggedly  persist,  than  this 
of  estimating  other  men's  conduct  by  the  standard  of  our 
own  feelings.  There  is  no  more  mischievous  absurdity 
than  this  judging  of  actions  from  the  outside  as  they  look 
to  us,  instead  of  from  the  inside  as  they  look  to  the  act 
ors  ;  nothing  more  irrational  than  to  criticize  deeds  as 
though  the  doers  of  them  had  the  same  desires,  hopes, 
fears,  and  restraints  with  ourselves.  We  cannot  under 
stand  another's  character  except  by  abandoning  our  own 
identity,  and  realizing  to  ourselves  his  frame  of  mind,  his 
want  of  knowledge,  his  hardships,  temptations,  and  dis 
couragements.  And  if  the  wealthier  classes  would  do 
this  before  forming  their  opinions  of  the  Avorking  man, 
their  verdicts  would  savour  somewhat  more  of  that  char 
ity  which  covereth  a  multitude  of  sins. 

i 

§  7.  After  all  it  is  a  pitiful  controversy,  this  about 
the  relative  vices  of  rich  and  poor.  Two  school-boys 
taunting  each  other  with  faults  of  which  they  were  equally 
guilty,  would  best  parody  it.  Whilst  indignant  Radical 
ism  dfiftormccs  "the  vile  aristocrats,"  these  in  their  turn 
enlarge  with  horror  on  the  brutality  of  the  mob.  Neither 
party  sees  its  own  sins.  Neither  party  recognizes  in  the 
other,  itself  in  a  different  dress.  Neither  party  can  be 
lieve  thatjt  would  do  all  the  other  does  if  placed  in  like 
circumstances.  Yet  a  cool  bystander  finds  nothing  to 
choose  between  them ;  knows  that  these  class  recrimina 
tions  are  but  the  inflammatory  symptoms  of  a  uniformly- 
diffused  immorality.  Label  men  how  you  please  witli 
titles  of  "  upper,"  and  "  middle,"  and  "  lower,"  you  can 
not  prevent  them  being  units  of  the  same  society,  acted 
upon  by  the  same  spirit  of  the  age,  moulded  after  the 
same  type  of  character.  The  mechanical  la,w,  that  action 
and  reaction  are  equal,  has  its  moral  analogue.  The  deed 
of  one  man  to  another  tends  ultimately  to  produce  a  like 


254  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

effect  upon  both,  be  the  deed  good  or  bad.  Do  but  put 
them  in  relationshi^and  no  division  into  castes,  no  differ 
ences  of  wealth,  can  prevent  men  from  assimilating. 
Whoso  is  placed  amongst  the  savage  wili^  in  process  of 
time  get  savage  too ;  let  his  companions  be  treacherous, 
and  he  will  become  treacherous  in  self-defence ;  surround 
him  with  the  kind-hearted  and  he  will  soften ;  amidst  the 
refined  he  will  acquire  polish ;  and  the  same  influences 
which  thus  rapidly  adapt  the  individual  to  his  society, 
ensure,  though  by  a  slower  process,  the  gejiejal_uiuihnnity 
of  a  national  character.  jThis  is  no  unsupported  theory. 
Look  when  or  where  we  please,  thickly-strewn  proofs 
may  be  gathered.  The  cruelties  of  the  old  Roman  rulers 
were  fully  paralleled  by  those  over  which  the  populace 
gloated  in  their  arenas.  During  the  servile  wars  of  the 
middle  ages,  barons  tortured  rebels,  and  rebels  tortured 
barons,  with  equally  diabolical  ferocity.  Those  massacres 
which  took  place  a  few  years  since  in  Gallicia  covered 
with  infamy  both  the  people  who  committed  them  and  the 
government  who  paid  for  them  at  per  head.  The  Assam 
chiefs,  to  whom  the  East  India  Company  have  allowed 
compensation  for  abandoning  their  established  right  of 
plunder,  are  neither  better  nor  worse  than  the  mass  of  the 
people,  amongst  whom  joint-stock  robbing  companies  are 
common.  A  similar  sameness  is  exhibited  in  Russia, 
where  all  are  alike  swindlers,  from  the  Prince  Marshal 
who  cheats  the  troops  out  of  their  rations,  the  officers  who 
rob  the  Emperor  of  his  stores,  the  magistrates  who  require 
bribing  before  they  will  act,  the  police  who  have  secret 
treaties  with  the  thieves,  the  shopkeepers  who  boast  of 
their  successful  trickeries,  down  to  the  postmasters  and 
dhrosky-drivers  with  their  endless  impositions.  In  Ire 
land,  during  the  last  century,  whilst  the  people  had  their 
faction  fights  and  secret  revenge  societies,  duelling  formed 
the  amusement  of  the  gentry,  and  was  carried  to  such  a 


OLD   BARBARIC   USAGES.  255 

pitch  that  the  barrister  was  bound  to  give  satisfaction  to 
the  witness  he  had  bullied,  or  to  the  client  who  was  dis 
satisfied  with  him.*  And  let  us  not  forget  how  com 
pletely  this  unity  of  character  is  exhibited  by  the  Irish  of 
to-day,  amongst  whom  Orangemen  and  Catholics  display 
the  same  truculent  bigotry ;  amongst  whom  magistrates 
and  people  join  in  party  riots ;  and  amongst  whom  the 
improvidence  of  the  peasantry  is  only  to  be  paralleled  by 
that  of  the  landlords.  Our  own  history  furnishes  like  il 
lustrations  in  plenty.  The  time  when  England  swarmed 
with  highwaymen  and  outlaws,  and  when  the  populace 
had  that  sneaking  kindness  for  a  bold  robber  still  shown 
in  some  parts  of  the  Continent,  was  the  time  when  kings 
also  played  the  bandit ;  when  they  cheated  their  creditors 
by  debasing  the  coinage ;  when  they  impressed  labourers 
to  build  their  palaces  (Windsor  Castle,  for  instance), 
obliging  them  under  pain  of  imprisonment  to  take  the 
wages  offered;  and  when  they  seized  and  sold  men's 
goods,  paying  the  owners  less  than  a  third  of  what  the 
goods  realized.  During  the  age  of  religious  persecution, 
Papists  martyred  Protestants,  and  Protestants  martyred 
Papists,  with  equal  cruelty ;  and  Cavaliers  and  Round 
heads  treated  each  other  with  the  same  rancour.  In  the 
present  day  dishonesty  shows  itself  not  less  in  the  falsifi 
cation  of  dockyard  accounts,  or  the  "  cooking  "  of  railway 
reports,  than  in  burglary  or  sheep-stealing ;  whilst  those 
who  see  heartlessness  in  the  dealings  of  slop-tailors  and 
their  sweaters,  may  also  find  it  in  the  conduct  of  rich 
landlords,  who  get  double  rent  from  poor  allotment  hold 
ers,!  and  in  that  of  respectable  ladies  who  underpay  half- 

*  "  It  is  time,"  said  a  veteran  of  this  school,  "  to  retire  from  the  bar, 
since  this  new-fangled  special  pleading  has  superseded  the  use  of  gunpow 
der." — Sketches  of  Ireland  Sixty  Years  Ago. 

\  "  Allotments  are  generally  given  on  poor  and  useless  pieces  of  land, 
but  the  thorough  cultivation  they  receive  soon  raises  them  to  a  high  pitch 


256  THE    CONSTITUTION    OF   THE   STATE. 


starved  seamstresses.*  Changes  in  tastes  and  amuse 
ments  are  similarly  common  to  all.  The  contrast  between 
the  Squire  Westerns  and  their  descendants  has  its  analogy 
amongst  the  people.  As  in  Spain  a  bull  fight  is  still  the 
favourite  pastime  of  both  the  Queen  and  her  subjects,  so 
in  England  fifty  years  ago,  the  cock-pit  and  the  prize-ring 
were  patronized  alike  by  peer  and  pauper ;  and  a  refer 
ence  to  the  sporting  papers  will  show  that  the  lingering 
instincts  of  the  savage  are  at  this  moment  exhibited  by 
about  an  equal  percentage  of  all  classes. 

Thus  the  alleged  homogeneity  of  national  character  is 
abundantly  exemplified.  And  so  long  as  the  assimilating 
influences  productive  of  it  continue  at  work,  it  is  folly  to 
suppose  any  one  grade  of  a  community  can  be  morally 
different  from  the  rest.  In  whichever  rank  you  see  cor 
ruption,  be  assured  it  equally  pervades  all  ranks — be  as 
sured  it  is  the  symptom  of  a  bad  social  diathesis.  Whilst 
the  virus  of  depravity  exists  in  one  part  of  the  body  poli 
tic,  no  other  part  can  remain  healthy. 

of  fertility.  The  more  fertile  they  become  the  more  the  rent  of  each  portion 
is  increased,  and  we  were  informed  that  there  are  at  present  allotments  on 
the  Duke's  property,  which,  under  the  influence  of  the  same  competition 
which  exists  with  reference  to  farms,  bring  his  Grace  a  rent  of  2L,  3?.,  and 
even  41.  an  acre." — Times  Agricultural  Commissioner  on  the  Blenheim  Es 
tates. 

*  See  Letters  on  "  Labour  and  the  Poor."  An  officer's  widow  says : 
"  Generally,  the  ladies  are  much  harder  as  to  their  terms  than  the  trades 
people  ;  oh,  yes,  the  tradespeople  usually  show  more  lenity  towards  the 
needlewomen  than  the  ladies.  I  know  the  mistress  of  an  institution  who 
refused  some  chemises  of  a  lady  who  wanted  to  have  them  made  at  9d. 
She  said  she  would  not  impose  upon  the  poor  workpeople  so  much  as  to  get 
them  made  at  that  price." — Morning  Chronicle,  November  16,  1849.  A 
vender  of  groundsel  and  turfs  for  singing  birds  says :  "  The  ladies  are  very 
hard  with  a  body.  They  tries  to  beat  me  down,  and  particular  in  the  mat 
ter  of  turfs.  They  tell  me  they  can  buy  half-a-dozen  for  lc?.,  so  I'm  obli 
gated  to  let  'em  have  three  or  four." — Morning  Chronicle,  November  20, 
1849. 


WORKING   CLASSES   NOT   ALONE   IGNORANT.  257 

jjf 

§   8.     When   it   is  urged  that   the  working   classes 
ought  not  to  be  admitted  within  the  pale  of  the  constitu 
tion  "because  they  are  ignorant,  A  is  tacitly  assumed  that 
/the  existing  electors  are  enlightened,"'  And,  quietly  mak 
ing  this  assumption,  the  opponents  of  popular  enfranchise 
ment  argue,  at  their  ease,  that  it  would  be  extremely  im 
politic  to  swamp  intelligent  ten-pound  householders,  free 
holders,  and  tenants  at  will,  by  letting  in  upon  them  the 
*.  masses  lying  in  outer  darkness. 

Painful  as  it  may  be,  the  pleasing  illusion  that  our 
present  constituency  is  thus  honourably  distinguished, 
must  be  dispelled.  If  by  ignorance  is  meant  want  of 
information  on  matters  which,  for  the  due  performance  of 
his  function,  the  citizen  should  understand  (and  no  other 
definition  is  to  the  point),  then  it  is  a  great  error  to  sup 
pose  that  ignorance  is  peculiar  to  the  unenfranchised. 
-Were  there  no  other  illustrations,  sufficient  proof  that  this 
ignorance  is  shared  by  those  on  the  register,  might  be 
gathered  from  their  conduct  at  elections.  Much  might 
be  inferred  from  the  tuft-hunting  spirit  exhibited  in  the 
choice  of  aristocratic  representatives.  C  It  might  be  asked 
whether  those  are  intelligent  voters  whose  ears  are  tick 
led  by  the  euphony  of  a  title,  whose  eyes  are  attracted  by 
heraldric  emblazonry,  or  whose  votes  are  determined  by 
the  acreage  of  a  candidate's  estates.  Some  doubts  might 
be  cast  on  the  penetration  of  men  who,  whilst  they  com 
plain  of  the  pressure  of  taxation,  send  to  parliament  hordes 
of  military  and  naval  officers,  who  have  an  interest  in 
making  that  taxation  still  greater.  Or  the  pretensions  of 
the  present  monopolists  of  political  power  might  be  tested 
by  quotations  from  the  debates  of  a  farmer's  market-ordi 
nary,  and  from  those  of  the  assembly  into  which  electoral 
wisdom  is  distilled.  But  without  dilating  upon  these  gen 
eral  considerations,  let  us  examine  a  few  of  the  opinions 
entertained  by  the  mercantile  classes  upon  state  questionSj 


258  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF  THE   STATE. 

and  see  how  far  these  opinions  entitle  them  to  a  reputation 
for  enlightenment. 

"  Money  is  wealth,"  was  the  dogma  universally  held 
by  legislators  and  economists  before  the  days  of  Adam 
Smith,  as  a  self-evident  truth ;  and  in  conformity  with  it 
acts  of  parliament  were,  by  general  consent,  framed  to 
attract  and  retain  in  the  country  as  much  coin  as  possi 
ble.  *  f  Mr.  Mill,  in  the  introduction  to  his  recent  elaborate 

J> 
work,  assumes  that  this  belief  is  now  extinct.     It  may  be 

so  amongst  philosophers,  but  it  is  still  prevalent  in  the 
trading  world.  We  continue  to  hear  acts  praised  as 
tending  to  "  circulate  money ; "  and  on  analyzing  the 
alarm  periodically  raised  that  "  the  money  is  going  out 
of  the  country,"  we  find  such  an  occurrence  regarded  as 
a  disaster  in  itself,  and  not  simply  as  indicating  that  the 
country  is  poor  in  some  essential  commodity.  Is  there  not 
occasion  for  a  little  "  enlightenment "  here  ? 

f  Again ;  no  small  number  of  respectable  people  seeing 
that  increased  consumption  always  accompanies  prosper 
ity,  infer  that  consumption  is  in  itself  beneficial — is  the 
cause  of  prosperity,  instead  of  its  collateral  effect ;  and 
hence,  on  witnessing  a  fire,  or  the  mad  extravagance  of 
some  spendthrift,  they  console  themselves  with  the  reflec 
tion  that  such  things  are  "  good  for  trade."  Dangerous 
voters  these,  if  sound  political  knowledge  is  a  needful 
qualification. 

Similarly  diffused  amongst  the  middle  ranks,  is  a  .no 
tion  that  the  withdrawal  of  a  large  part  of  the  funds  of 
the  community  by  the  non-producing  classes  is  no  real 
detriment  to  the  rest;  for  that  as  the  money  thus  ab 
stracted  is  subsequently  spent  amongst  the  rest,  it  event 
ually  comes  to  the  same  thing  as  though  it  had  not  been 
abstracted  at  all.  Even  a  professed  political  economist — 
Doctor  Chalmers — maintains  that  the  revenues  of  land 
owners  form  no  deduction  from  the  means  of  society,  see- 


DE.  CIIALMEKS    ON   POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  259 

ing  that  the  expenditure  of  such  revenues  consists  "  in  a 
transference  to  the  industrious  of  sustenance  and  support 
for  their  services  :  "  which  proposition  amounts  to  this — 
that  it  matters  not  in  the  end  whether  A  and  his  servants 
B,  C,  and  D,  live  on  the  produce  of  their  own  industry,  or 
on  the  produce  of  other  men's  industry !  * 

•"Another  mistake  current  alike  amongst  rich  and  poor 
is,  that  the  speculations  of  corn-dealers  are  injurious  to 
the  public.  So  indignant  are  many  well-meaning  men  at 
what  they  conceive  to  be  a  practice  of  intolerable  cruelty, 
that  it  is  scarcely  possible  to  make  them  see  how  perfect 
freedom  of  trade  is  nationally  advantageous  in  this,  as  in 
all  other  cases.  Their  anger  blinds  them  to  the  fact  that 
were  not  the  'price  raised  immediately  after  a  deficient 
harvest  by  the  purchases  of  these  large  factors,  there 
would  be  nothing  to  prevent  the  people  from  consuming 
food  at  their  ordinary  rate  /  which  would  end  in  the  inad 
equate  supply  being  eaten  up  long  before  the  ripening  of 
the  next  crop.  They  do  not  perceive  that  this  mercantile 
operation  is  analogous  in  its  effect  to  putting  the  crew  of  a 
vessel  on  diminished  rations  when  the  stock  of  provisions 
is  found  insufficient  to  last  out  the  voyage.  A  somewhat 
serious  error  this,  for  electors  to  labour  under ;  especially 
as  many  of  them  would  prevent  the  buying  up  of  corn  by 
legal  penalties ! 

What  crude  theories  prevail  also  respecting  the  power 
of  a  legislature  to  encourage  different  branches  of  indus- 

*  No  doubt  the  belief  which  Dr.  Chalmers  combats,  viz.,  that  the  land 
lord's  revenue  is  Avholly  consumed  by  him,  is  an  erroneous  one ;  for,  as  he 
points  out,  the  greater  portion  of  it  goes  to  maintain  those  who  directly  or 
indirectly  minister  to  the  landlord's  wants :  but  Dr.  Chalmers  overlooks  the 
fact  that  did  the  landlord  not  exist,  the  services  which  such  now  render  to 
him  in  return  for  "  sustenance  and  support,"  would  be  rendered  to  those 
producers  from  whom  the  landlord's  revenue  originally  came ;  and  that  in 
the  loss  of  these  services  society  suffers. 


260  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

try — "agricultural  interests"  and  other  "interests."  It 
is  not  farmers  only  who  labour  under  the  mistake  that 
their  occupation  can  be  made  permanently  more  prosper 
ous  than  the  rest  by  act  of  parliament :  educated  towns 
people,  too,  participate  in  the  delusion ;  quite  forgetting 
that  the  greater  profitableness  artificially  given  to  any 
particular  trade,  inevitably  draws  into  that  trade  such  an 
increased  number  of  competitors  as  quickly  to  reduce  its 
proffered  advantages  to  the  general  level,  and  even  for 
a  time  below  that  level.  Is  not  the  educator  wanted 
behind  the  counter  and  on  the  farm,  as  well  as  in  the  work 
shop? 

Note  again  the  wild  ideas  entertained  on  currency 
questions.  We  smile  at  the  simplicity  which  in  times 
past  led  a  famine-pinched  populace*  to  ascribe  the  high 
price  of  bread  to  the  covetousness  of  bakers  and  millers ; 
yet  there  is  no  little  analogy  between  such  a  theory  and 
that  which  attributes  national  distress  to  bad  monetary 
arrangements.  Just  as  the  poor  man,  when  made  to  feel 
the  scarcity  of  food  by  having  to  pay  double  the  usual 
sum  for  a  loaf,  straightway  taxed  the  seller  of  the  loaf 
with  the  evil ;  so  do  many  traders  to  whom  commercial 
depression  comes  in  the  shape  of  a  difficulty  in  getting 
advances  from  their  bankers,  or  cash  for  their  bills  of  ex 
change,  conclude  that  the  "  circulating  medium "  is  in 
fault ;  being  ignorant,  like  their  hungry  prototypes,  that 
the  primary  cause  of  the  mischief  is  a  deficiency  in  the 
national  stock  of  food  or  other  commodities.  To  suppose 
that  a  state  of  general  privation  can  be  cured  by  the  issue 
of  bank  notes,  is  to  err  with  the  projector  of  perpetual 
motion,  who  hopes  to  make  power  out  of  nothing. 

\  Thus  the  tu  quoqiie  argument,  which  we  found  so  com 
pletely  to  neutralize  the  inference  drawn  from  the  alleged 
immorality  of  the  labouring  classes,  is  a  not  much  less 
cogent  answer  to  the  objection  urged  against  the  exten- 


IGNOKANCE   OF  THE   ENFKANCHISED.  261 

sion  of  the  suffrage  on  the  ground  of  popular  ignorance. 
If,  because  they  are  deficient  in  information,  the  people 
should  continue  unenfranchised,  then  for  a  like*.reason 
should  the  existing  electoral  body  he  enfranchised.  r  If  the 
two  classes  are  to  have  their  relative  degrees  of  competence 
to  wield  political  power  determined  by  comparing  the 
amounts  of  their  knowledge — their  political  knowledge, 
mind — then  the  advantage  on  the  side  of  the  present  hold 
ers  of  such  power  is  quite  insufficient  to  give  them  an  ex 
clusive  claim  to  itT*  As  we  have  just  seen,  a  great  propor 
tion  of  them  are  in  error  on  the  most  important  public 
questions — on  the  nature  of  wealth,  on  what  things  are 
"good  for  trade,"  on  the  relationship  of  producers  and 
nonproducers,  on  dealings  in  the  people's  food,  on  the 
"  encouragement "  of*trade,  on  the  influences  of  currency, 
and  so  forth.  Where,  then,  is  their  great  superiority  over 
the  non-electors  ?  Have  many  artisans  mistaken  excessive 
competition  for  the  cause  of  an  evil,  instead  of  taking  it 
for  what  it  is — the  symptom  of  one  ?  why  they  are  coun 
tenanced  in  this  error  by  not  a  few  of  the  educated.  Do 
working  men  hold  wrong  opinions  concerning  machinery  ? 
so  likewise  do  nearly  all  the  farmers  and  no  small  number 
of  tradesmen.  Is  the  false  impression  that  manufacturers 
can  raise  or  lower  wages  at  will,  prevalent  amongst  the 
masses  ?  it  is  widely  entertained,  too,  by  their  richer 
neighbours.  4jlow,  then,  can  the  ignorance  of  the  people 
be  urged  as  a  reason  for  refusing  them  votes  ^ 

§  9.  Those  who  cut  short  the  arguments  in  favour 
of  democracy  by  saying  that  it  has  been  tried  and  found 
wanting,  would  do  well  to  consider  whether  the  govern 
ments  they  refer  to  really  were  democratic  ones — whether 
a  true  democracy  has  ever  been  known — whether  such  a 
thing  can  be  found  even  now.  Of  arrangements  simu 
lating  it,  the  world  has  seen  not  a  few.  But  that  democ- 


262  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

racy  itself  has  ever  existed — existed,  that  is,  for  a  suffi 
cient  length  of  time  to  admit  of  its  fruits  being  judged — 
or  that  it  was  possible  for  it  so  to  have  existed  during  the 
past  condition  of  humanity,  is  denied.  A  return  to  defi 
nitions  settles  the  matter  at  once.  A  democracyjjproperly 
so  called,  is  a  political  organization  modelled  in  accord 
ance  with  the  law  of  equal  freedom.  And  if  so,  those 
cannot  be  called  democracies  under  which,  as  under  the 
Greek  and  Roman  governments,  from  four-fifths  to  eleven- 
twelfths  of  the  people  were  slaves.  Neither  can  those  be 
called  democracies,  which,  like  the  constitutions  of  me 
diaeval  Italy,  conferred  power  on  the  burghers  and  nobles 
only.  Nor  can  those  even  be  called  democracies,  which, 
like  the  Swiss  states,  have  always  treated  a  certain  unin 
corporated  class  as  political  outlaws.  Enlarged  aristocra 
cies  these  should  be  termed ;  not  democracies.  No  mat 
ter  whether  they  be  a  minority  or  a  majority  to  whom 
power  is  denied ;  the  exclusion  of  them  is  in  spirit  the 
same,  and  the  definition  of  a  democracy  is  equally  broken. 
The  man  who  steals  a  penny  we  call  dishonest,  as  well  as 
the  man  who  steals  a  pound ;  and  we  do  so  because  his 
act  equally  testifies  to  a  certain  defect  of  character.  Sim 
ilarly  we  must  consider  a  government  aristocratic,  be  the 
class  it  excludes  large  or  small. 

They,  however,  make  the  strangest  mistake  who,  re 
ferring  as  they  commonly  do  to  the  United  States,  urge 
the  existence  of  slavery  as  itself  an  argument  against  de 
mocracy.  Put  in  a  definite  form,  this  would  aptly  serve 
the  logician  as  a  specimen  absurdity.  A  pseudo-democ 
racy  is  found  not  democratic  enough,  and  it  is  therefore 
inferred  that  democracy  is  a  bad  thing !  Whilst  some 
Autolycus  is  eulogizing  honesty  and  quoting  himself  as  a 
sample  of  it,  he  is  detected  in  the  act  of  picking  his  neigh 
bour's  pocket ;  whereupon  it  is  argued  that  honesty  ought 
forthwith  to  be  repudiated!  With  his  mouth  full  of 


DEMOCEACY   A   GROWTH.  263 

"  noble  sentiments,"  and  leading  a  seemingly  moral  life,  a 
Joseph  Surface  deceives  his  friends ;  and,  on  its  being  dis 
covered  that  he  is  a  villain,  there  arises  the  exclamation — 
"  What  a  shocking  thing  is  this  morality  !  " 

But,  passing  over  what  might  further  be  said  concern 
ing  the  alleged  failure  of  democracies,  let  it  be  granted  that 
they  have  failed ;  let  it  be  granted  that  there  have  from 
time  to  time  been  forms,  of  government  approaching  to. 
the  democratic — nay,  that  in  the  course  of  revolutions  the 
thing  itself  has  had  a  transient  existence ;  let  all  this  be 
granted,  it  still  proves  nothing.  For  which  is  it  amongst 
the  endeavours  of  man  that  does  not  at  first  fail?  Is  not 
perseverance  through  a  series  of  defeats  the  natural  his 
tory  of  success  ?  Does  not  the  process  we  pass  through 
in  learning  to  walk  afford  us  a  type  of  all  human  expe 
riences  ?  Though  we  see  a  child  make  hundreds  of  boot 
less  attempts  to  maintain  its  balance,  we  do  not  conclude 
that  it  is  doomed  to  remain  forever  upon  all-fours.  Nor 
do  we,  in  the  conduct  of  its  education,  cease  telling  it  to 
"  try  again,"  because  it  has  many  times  fallen  short  of  a 
desired  achievement.  Doubtless  it  would  be  unwise  to 
base  an  argument  upon  the  assumed  analogy  between  the 
growth  of  the  individual  and  of  the  state  (though,  both 
being  governed  by  the  same  laws  of  human  development, 
there  is  probably  a  genuine  analogy  between  them) ;  but 
the  simile  may  fairly  be  employed  to  hint  that  the  failure 
of  past  efforts  made  by  society  to  preserve  the  erect  atti 
tude  of  democracy,  by  no  means  shows  that  such  attitude 
is  not  the  proper  one. 

And,  in  fact,  our  theory  anticipates  such  failures.  We  \ 
have  already  seen  that  a  high  form  of  government  is  ren- 
dered  practicable  only  by  a  high  type  of  character — that 
freedom  can  increase  only  as  fast  as  control  becomes  need 
less — that  the  perfect  man  alone  can  realize  the  perfect 
state.  A  democracy,  therefore,  being  the  highest  form 


264:  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

that  a  government  can  assume — indicative,  if  not  of  the 
ultimate  phase  of  civilization,  still  of  the  penultimate  one- 
must  of  necessity  fail  in  the  hands  of  barbarous  and  semi- 
barbarous  men. 

Whilst,  then,  it  is  maintained  that  nearly  all  these  al 
leged  failures  of  democracy  are  not  failures  of  democracy 
at  all,  but  of  something  else,  it  is  argued  that  the  fact  of 
those  comparatively  genuine   democracies  set  up  during 
Q^   revolutions,  lapsing  rapidly  back  into  preexisting  arrange 
ments,  is  in  nowise  at  variance  with  our  position. 
*£&* 

§  10.  Whether  in  any  given  case  a  democracy  is 
practicable,  is  a  question  that  will  always  find  its  own  so 
lution.  The  physiologist  shows  us  that  in  an  animal  or 
ganism,  the  soft  parts  determine  the  forms  of  the  hard 
ones ;  and  it  is  equally  true  that  in  the  social  organism, 
the  seemingly  fixed  framework  of  laws  and  institutions,  is 
moulded  by  the  'seemingly  forceless  thing — character. 
Social  arrangements  are  the  bones  to  that  body,  of  which 
the  national  morality  is  the  life ;  and  they  will  grow  into 
free,  healthy  shapes,  or  into  sickly  and  cramped  ones  ac 
cording  as  that  morality,  that  life,  is  vigorous  or  other 
wise. 

The  vital  principle  of  society  we  have  seen  to  be  the 
law  of  equal  freedom  :  and  we  have  further  seen  that  in  the 
compound  faculty  originating  a  moral  sense,  there  exists 
an  agent  enabling  men  to  appreciate,  to  love,  and  to  act 
up  to  this  law  (Chaps.  IV.  and  V.).  We  have  seen  that 
to  realize  the  Divine  idea — greatest  happiness — the  human 
constitution  must  be  such  as  that  each  man  confining  him 
self  within  his  own  sphere  of  activity,  shall  leave  intact 
the  similar  spheres  of  activity  of  others  (Chap.  III.)  ;  and 
we  have  further  seen  that  an  instinct'of  our  own  freedom, 
and  a  sympathy  which  makes  us  respect  the  like  freedom 
of  our  fellows,  compose  a  mechanism  capable  of  establish- 


DEMOCRACY   AS   A   HIGHER   SOCIAL    STATE.  265 

ing  this  state  of  things.  If  these  feelings  are  undevel 
oped,  a  people's  beliefs,  laws,  customs,  and  manners,  will 
be  aggressive  in  their  character:  let  them  act  with  due 
force,  and  the  organization  of  the  community,  equally  with 
the  conduct  of  its  members,  will  be  in  harmony  with  the 
social  law.  Political  forms  indicate  the  degree  of  effi 
ciency  with  which  this  mental  mechanism  works ;  are  in  a 
manner  supplementary  to  such  mechanism ;  are  bad  and 
coercive  if  it  is  defective ;  become  ameliorated  in  propor 
tion  as  it  acts  well.  And  thus  democracy,  as  one  of  the 
higher  social  forms,  is  of  necessity  identified,  both  in  ori 
gin  and  practicability,  with  a  dominant  moral  sense.  This 
fact  has  been  already  more  than  once  hinted ;  but  it  will 
be  desirable  now  to  examine  more  attentively  than  here 
tofore  the  grounds  on  which  it  is  alleged. 

Observe  first,  then,  that  in  the  earlier  stages  of  civili 
zation,  before  the  process  of  adaptation  has  yet  produced 
much  effect,  the  desire  for  political  equality  does  not  exist. 
There  were  no  agitations  for  representative  government 
amongst  the  Egyptians,  or  the  Persians,  or  the  Assyrians ; 
with  them  all  disputes  Vere  as  to  who  should  be  tyrant. 
By  the  Hindoos  a  similar  state  of  things  is  exhibited  to 
the  present 'hour.  The  Russians,  too,  are  still  under  this 
phase;  and,  in  their  utter  carelessness  of  civil  liberty, 
shun  any  one  who  preaches  justice  and  condemns  tyranny, 
as  a  perverse  malcontent.  The  like  mental  condition  was 
shown  during  the  earlier  stages  of  our  own  progress.  In 
the  middle  ages  fealty  to  a  feudal  lord  was  accounted  a 
duty,  and  the  assertion  of  personal  freedom  a  crime. 
Rights  of  man  were  not  then  dreamed  of.  Revolutions 
were  nothing  but  dynastic  quarrels ;  not  what  they  have 
been  in  later  times — attempts  to  make  governments  more 
popular.  And  if,  after  glancing  at  the  changes  that  have 
taken  place  between  the  far  past  and  the  present,  we  re 
flect  upon  the  character  of  modern  ideas  and  agitations, 
12 


266  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

on  declarations  of  rights,  liberty  of  the  press,  slave  eman 
cipation,  removal  of  religious  disabilities,  Reform  Bills, 
Chartism,  &c.,  and  consider  how  through  all  of  them  there 
/uns  a  kindred  spirit,  and  how  this  spirit  is  manifesting 
I  itself  with  constantly-increasing  intensity  and  universal- 
'  ity,  we  shall  see  that  these  facts  imply  some  moral  change ; 
and  explicable  as  they  are  by  the  growth  of  this  com 
pound  faculty  responding  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  it 
is  reasonable  to  consider  them  as  showing  the  mode  in 
which  such  faculty  seeks  to  place  social  arrangements  in 
harmony  with  that  law ;  or,  in  other  words,  as  illustrating 
the  efforts  of  the  moral  sense  to  realize  the  democratic 
state. 

If  a  democracy  is  produced  by  this  agency,  so  also  is 
it  rendered  practicable  by  it.  The  popular  form  of  gov 
ernment  as  contrasted  with  the  monarchical,  is  professedly 
one  which  places  less  restraint  upon  the  individual.  In 
speaking  of  it  we  use  such  terms  as  free  institutions,  civil 
liberty,  seT/'-government,  all  implying  this.  But  the  dimi 
nution  of  external  restraint  can  take  place  only  at  the 
same  rate  as  the  increase  of  internal  restraint.  Conduct 
has  to  be  ruled  either  from  without  or  from  within.  If 
the  rule  from  within  is  not  efficient,  there  must  exist  a 
supplementary  rule  from  without.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
all  men  are  properly  ruled  from  within,  government  be- 
I  comes  needless,  and  all  men  are  perfectly  free.  ISTow  the 
I  chief  faculty  of  self-rule  being  the  moral  sense  (Chap.  V.), 
the  degree  of  freedom  in  their  institutions  which  any 
given  people  can  bear,  will  be  proportionate  to  the  dif 
fusion  of  this  moral  sense  amongst  them.  And  only  when 
its  influence  greatly  predominates  can  so  large  an  instal 
ment  of  freedom  as  a  democracy  become  possible. 

Lastly,  the  supremacy  of  this  same  faculty  affords  the 
only  guarantee  for  the  stability  of  a  democracy.  On  the 
part  of  the  people  it  gives  rise  to  what  we  call  a  jealousy 


GUARANTEE   OF  THE   STABILITY   OF  DEMOCRACY.      267 

of  their  liberties — a  watchful  determination  to  resist  any 
thing  like  encroachment  upon  their  rights :  whilst  it  gen 
erates  amongst  those  in  power  such  a  respect  for  these 
rights  as  checks  any  desire  they  may  have  to  aggress. 
Conversely,  let  the  ruled  Tbe  deficient  in  the  instinct  of 
freedom,  and  they  will  be  indifferent  to  the  gradual  usurp 
ation  of  their  privileges  so  long  as  it  entails  no  immediate 
inconvenience  upon  them;  and  the  rulers  in  such  case, 
being  deficient  in  sympathetic  regard  for  these  privileges, 
will  be,  to  a  like  extent,  unscrupulous  in  usurping.  Let 
us  observe,  in  detail,  the  different  modes  in  which  men 
thus  contradistinguished  comport  themselves  under  a  rep 
resentative  form  of  government.  Amongst  a  people  not 
yet  fitted  for  such  a  form,  citizens,  lacking  the  impulse  to 
claim  equal  power  with  each  other,  become  careless  in  the 
exercise  of  their  franchise,  doubt  whether  it  is  of  any  use 
to  them,  and  even  pride  themselves  on  not  interfering  in 
public  affairs.*  Provided  their  liberties  are  but  indirectly 
affected,  they  will  watch  the  passing  of  the  most  insidious 
measures  with  vacant  unconcern.  It  is  only  barefaced 
aggressions  that  they  can  perceive  to  be  aggressions  at  all. 
Placing  as  they  do  but  little  value  upon  their  privileges, 
they  are  readily  bribed.  When  threatened,  instead  of 
assuming  that  altitude  of  dogged  resistance  which  the  in 
stinct  of  freedom  dictates,  they  truckle.  If  tricked  out 
of  a  right  of  citizenship,  they  are  quite  indifferent  about 
getting  it  again ;  and  indeed  when  the  exercise  of  it  con 
flicts  with  any  immediate  interest  are  glad  to  give  it  up — 
will  even  petition,  as  in  times  past  did  many  of  the  cor 
porate  towns,  both  in  England  and  Spain,  that  they  may 
be  excused  from  electing  representatives.  Meanwhile,  in 
accordance  with  that  law  of  social  homogeneity  lately 
dwelt  upon,  those  in  authority  are  in  a  like  ratio  ready  to 

*  Instance  the  behaviour  of  the  Prussian  electors  since  the  late  revolu 
tion. 


268  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

encroach.  They  intimidate,  they  bribe,  they  plot,  and  by 
degrees  establish  a  comparatively  coercive  government. 
On  the  other  hand,  amongst  a  people  sufficiently  endowed 
with  the  faculty  responding  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom, 
no  such  retrograde  process  is  possible.  The  man  of  gen 
uinely  democratic  feeling  loves  liberty  as  a  miser  loves  gold, 
for  its  own  sake  and  quite  irrespective  of  its  advantages 
(p.  113).  What  he  thus  highly  values  he  sleeplessly 
watches ;  he  quickly  detects  any  attempt  at  diminution 
of  it;  and  he  opposes  aggression  the  moment  it  com 
mences.  Should  any  assume  undue  prerogatives,  he 
straightway  steps  up  to  them,  and  demands  their  author 
ity  for  so  doing.  Transactions  that  seem  in  the  remotest 
degree  underhand  awaken  his  suspicions,  which  are  not  to 
be  laid  so  long  as  any  thing  remains  unexplained.  He 
scents  out  an  abuse  with  instinctive  sagacity,  and  having 
found  one,  never  rests  until  it  is  abolished.  If  in  any  pro 
posed  arrangement  there  be  a  latent  danger  to  the  liber 
ties  of  himself  and  others — any  germ  of  irresponsible 
power,  he  instantly  discovers  it  and  refuses  his  consent. 
He  is  alarmed  by  such  a  proposal  as  the  disfranchisement 
of  a  constituency  by  the  legislature ;  for  it  at  once  occurs 
to  him  that  the  measure  thus  levelled  against  one  may  be 
levelled  against  many.  To  call  that  responsible  govern 
ment  under  which  a  cabinet  minister  can  entangle  the 
nation  in  a  quarrel  about  some  paltry  territory  before  they 
know  any  thing  of  it,  he  sees  to  be  absurd.  It  needs  no 
chain  of  reasoning  to  show  him  that  the  assumption,  by  a 
delegated  assembly,  of  the  power  to  lengthen  its  own  ex 
istence  from  three  years  to  seven,  is  an  infraction  of  the 
representative  principle ;  he  feels  that  it  is  so ;  and  no 
plausible  professions  of  patriotism,  no  boasting  of  honour 
able  intentions,  can  check  his  opposition  to  the  setting  up 
of  so  dangerous  a  precedent.  Still  more  excited  is  he 
when  applied  to  for  grants  of  public  money,  with  the  under- 


THE   CONDITION   OF   LIBEKAL   INSTITUTIONS.  269 

standing  that  on  a  future  occasion  he  shall  be  told  how 
they  have  been  spent.  Flimsy  excuses  about  "  exigencies 
of  the  state,"  and  the  like,  cannot  entrap  him  into  so  glar 
ing  an  act  of  self-stultification.  He  listens  to  them  frown- 
ingly,  and  maintaining  as  he  does  that  the  protection  of 
men's  rights  is  the  chief,  or  rather  the  sole,  "  exigency  of 
the. state,"  sternly  negatives  the  request.  Thus  is  he  ever 
on  the  watch  to  extirpate  incipient  oppression ;  to  nip 
abuses  in  the  bud ;  or,  if  such  an  expression  is  allowable, 
to  stop  encroachment  before  it  begins.  And  when  a  com 
munity  consists  of  men  animated  by  the  spirit  thus  exem 
plified,  the  continuance  of  liberal  institutions  is  certain. 

/ Political  freedom,  therefore,  is,  as  we  say,  an  external 
result  of  jiu  internal  sentiment — is  alike,  in  origin,  practi 
cability,  and  permanence,  dependent  on  the  moral  sense; 
and  it  is  only  when  this  is  supreme  in  its  influence  that  so 
high  a  form  of  social  organization  as  a  democracy  can  be 
maintained. 

__  i   *  *' 

§  11.  And  thus  we  arrive  at  the  true  answer  to 
that  question  at  present  so  widely  agitated — Is  a  purely 
popular  form  of  government  practicable  now  ?  For,,  as 
the  sentiment  by  which  a  state  of  perfect  political  liberty 
is  generated,  is  also  the  one  by  which  it  is  upheld,  there 
immediately  suggests  itself  the  corollary  that,  when  the 
sentiment  is  strong  enough  to  generate  it,  it  is  strong 
enough  to  uphold  it.  Whenever,  therefore,  a  people 
calmly  arrives  at  the  conclusion  that  democratic  institu 
tions  are  right ;  whenever  they  dispassionately  determine 
that  they  shall  be  adopted ;  or,  in  other  words,  whenever 
the  circumstances  show  that  the  setting  up  of  such  insti 
tutions  is  not  an  accident,  but  results  from  the  ascendency 
of  the  aforesaid  sentiment ;  then,  and  then  alone,  are  such 
institutions  permanently  possible. 

In  the  opinion,  now  happily  so  prevalent,  that  the  pa- 


270        THE  CONSTITUTION  OF  THE  STATE. 

cific  mode  of  working  out  political  changes  is  the  only 
efficient  one,  we  have  a  collateral  expression  of  this  truth. 
Men  see  that  freedom  achieved  by  the  sword  is  uniformly 
lost  again ;  but  that  it  is  lasting  when  gained  by  peaceful 
agitation.  Hence  they  very  properly  infer  the  propriety 
of  carrying  reforms  solely  by  means  which  the  moral  law 
recognizes — means  which  do  not  involve  violations  of  it. 
Right  as  this  conclusion  may  be,  however,  it  is  not  philo 
sophically  understood.  Men  do  not  see  why  the  thing  is 
so.  There  is  no  truth  in  the  usual  supposition  that  the 
loss  of  liberties  obtained  by  violence  is  a  kind  of  retribu 
tion.  It  is  not  that  bloodshed  vitiates  the  free  institutions 
it  may  help  to  set  up ;  nor  is  it  that  when  peacefully  es 
tablished  such  institutions  are  preserved  by  virtue  of  their 
being  so  established ;  but  it  is  that  the  manner  in  which 
the  change  is  wrought  indicates  the  national  character, 
and  proves  it  to  be  respectively  unfit  or  fit  for  the  new 
social  form.  A  brief  examination  of  the  moral  conditions 
implied  by  these  different  kinds  of  evolution  will  show 
this. 

When  an  old  regime  is  overthrown  by  force,  no  guar 
antee  is  given  that  the  new  one  put  in  its  place  will  sat- 
;  isfy  the  wants  of  the  age.  The  occurrence  is  simply  a 
demonstration  that  the  miseries  inflicted  under  this  old 
regime  were  no  longer  bearable.  To  repeat  the  saying  of 
Sully,  quoted  by  Burke,  and  which  is  perfectly  true  when 
applied  to  convulsions  of  this  nature — "  It  is  never  from 
the  desire  to  attack  that  the  people  rise,  but  from  impa 
tience  under  suffering."  Now  anger  against  an  agent  in 
flicting  pain  is  a  passion,  exhibited  by  brutes  as  well  as  by 
men ;  and  a  social  revolution  wrought  out  by  such  a  mo 
tive  power  is  not  likely  to  leave  behind  it  a  state  of  things 
specially  adapted  to  the  people's  circumstances.  That 
sudden  display  of  ill-temper  with  which  a  man  dashes  on 
the  ground  something  that  has  given  him  much  provoca- 


CONFOKMITY   OF   INSTITUTIONS   TO   CIIAEACTEE.        271 

tion,  and  yet  the  loss  of  which  he  will  subsequently  re 
gret,  serves  in  some  measure  to  illustrate  the  conduct  of  a 
people  thus  excited.  They  are  irritated,  and  justly  so  ; 
the  hold  which  authority  has  had  over  them  is  weakened ; 
that  sentiment  of  power-worship — that  loyalty,  as  we 
term  it — which  was  but  the  index  of  a  certain  adaptation 
between  their  characters  and  the  rule  they  had  lived  un 
der,  is  for  the  time  being  in  abeyance — is  silenced,  drowned 
in  the  rising  tide  of  their  wrath ;  and  when,  after  they 
had  destroyed  the  old  framework  of  things,  another  be 
comes  needful,  it  is  very  improbable  that  the  one  set  up 
during  this  temporary  state  of  excitement  will  be  one 
really  in  harmony  with  their  natural  characters.  Nay, 
indeed,  it  is  sure  to  be  out  of  harmony  with  their  natural 
characters ;  for  consider,  the  institutions  they  set  up  will 
bear  the  impress  of  the  feeling  then  prevalent — a  feeling 
widely  different  from  that  previously  exhibited,  and  also 
from  that  which  will  come  uppermost  again  by-and-by. 
Stimulated  by  transpiring  events,  the  germs  of  those  sen 
timents  destined  some  day  to  establish  genuine  political 
freedom,  assume  a  precocious  activity — seem  much  stronger 
and  more  general  than  they  really  are ;  whilst,  on  the 
contrary,  those  sentiments  which  upheld  the  preceding 
state  of  things  are  almost  wholly  dormant.  The  impro 
vised  form  of  government  exactly  answers  to  this  excep 
tional  condition  of  mind,  and  might  work  could  that  con 
dition  be  maintained ;  but  as  fast  as  the  popular  feeling 
ebbs  back  into  its  ordinary  channels,  so  fast  does  the  in 
congruity  between  the  new  arrangements  and  the  old 
character  make  itself  felt ;  and  so  fast  is  the  retrogression. 
On  viewing  the  facts,  through  the  foregoing  theory  of/ 
moral-sense  agency,  it  becomes  still  more  manifest  that 
free  institutions  obtained  by  violence  are  of  necessity 
pj:emature.  For  what  are  the  requisite  antecedents  to 
one  of  these  social  convulsions  ?  They  are  the  torments 


272  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE    STATE. 

of  a  wide-spread  and  deep-seated  injustice.  And  of  what 
character  is  this  injustice  the  exponent  ?  Evidently  a  char 
acter  deficient  in  those  sentiments  which  deter  men  from 
aggression — a  character  in  which  the  faculties  of  the  so 
cial  man  are  as  yet  imperfectly  developed — a  character, 
that  is,  by  which  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  not  duly  re 
sponded  to.  Hence  the  unscrupulous  trespasses  on  the 
one  part,  and  the  culpable  submission  on  the  other,  which, 
by  their  accumulated  results,  have  induced  so  terrible  a 
crisis.  Well :  though  by  a  revolution  the  people  may  re 
make  their  government,  they  cannot  remake  themselves. 
Slightly  changed,  perhaps,  they  may  be  in  the  passing 
through  a  period  of  such  fiery  excitement ;  but,  in  the 
main,  they  are  still  the  men  they  were.  The  old  process 
will  consequently  repeat  itself.  The  storm  of  passion  hav 
ing  died  away,  there  will  again  begin  these  encroachments 
and  this  indifference ;  and  they  will  continue  until,  by  a 
gradual  imposition  of  fresh  bonds,  the  nation  has  been 
reduced,  not,  indeed,  to  a  condition  as  bad  as  before,  but 
to  a  condition  not  greatly  in  advance  of  it. 

Of  political  ameliorations  pacifically  wrought  out,  ex 
actly  the  opposite  is  predicable.  These  appertain  to  a 
higher  phase  of  civilization.  In  the  first  place  they  pre 
suppose  the  popular  suffering  to  be  of  a  comparatively 
mild  type — no  longer  unbearable,  maddening ;  and,  other 
things  equal,  this  indicates  a  diminished  amount  of  injus 
tice  ;  and  a  diminished  amount  of  injustice  implies  a  more 
prevalent  and  energetic  moral  sense.  Thus  the  very  ante 
cedents  of  a  peaceful  agitation  serve  in  some  measure  to 
ensure  the  success  of  the  free  institutions  obtained  by  it. 
But  it  is  in  the  process  by  which  one  of  these  bloodless 
revolutions  is  brought  about  that  the  existence  of  the 
needful  popular  character  is  most  clearly  evinced.  For  in 
what  consists  the  vitality  of  such  a  movement  ?  What  is 
the  secret  power  that  originates  it ;  to  which  its  growth 


HIGHER  SENTIMENTS  OF  ADVANCING  CIVILIZATION.       2Y3 

is  due ;  and  by  the  help  of  which  it  triumphs  ?  Mani 
festly  this  feeling  that  responds  to  the  law  of  equal  free 
dom.  These  pertinacious  demands  for  political  equality 
are  simply  the  signs  of  its  increasing  activity.  Not  hun 
ger,  nor  the  anxiety  to  escape  from  torture,  nor  the  desire 
for  vengeance,  is  now  the  transforming  force,  but  a  calm 
unswerving  determination  to  get  human  liberties  recog 
nized.  The  carrying  out  one  of  these  battles  of  opinion 
to  a  successful  issue  through  long  delays  and  discourage 
ments,  through  ridicule  and  misrepresentation,  implies  a 
perennial  source  of  energy  quite  different  from  mere  insur 
rectionary  rage.  In  place  of  a  passing  gust  of  anger,  a 
persistent  and  ever-strengthening  sentiment  is  here  the 
acting  agent.  Agitation  is  its  gymnasium.  Men  in  whom 
it  predominates  cultivate  it  in  the  rest.  They  address  it 
in  speeches ;  they  write  articles  to  it ;  they  convene  meet 
ings  for  its  manifestation.  It  is  aroused  by  denunciations 
of  injustice ;  it  is  appealed  to  in  the  name  of  conscience ; 
it  is  conjured  by  all  that  is  fair  and  upright  and  equitable. 
Pictures  of  the  slave  and  the  tyrant  are  exhibited  to  excite 
its  abhorrence ;  a  state  of  pure  freedom  is  described  to  it 
as  the  one  to  be  loved  and  hoped  for ;  and  it  is  made  sen 
sible  of  the  sacredness  of  human  rights.  After  men's 
minds  have  been  for  many  years  thus  exercised  and  stim 
ulated,  a  sufficiently  intense  manifestation  of  feeling  is 
produced,  and  then  comes  the  reform.  But  this  feeling, 
mark,  proceeds  from  that  same  combination  of  faculties 
by  which,  as  we  have  seen,  free  institutions  are  upheld  and 
made  practicable.  One  of  these  agitations,  therefore,  is  a 
kind  of  apprenticeship  to  the  liberties  obtained  by  it. 
The  power  to  get  freedom  becomes  the  measure  of  the 
power  to  use  it.  The  law  of  social  forms  is  that  they  shall 
be  expressive  of  national  character ;  they  come  into  exist 
ence  bearing  its  impress  ;  and  they  live  only  so  long  as  it 
supplies  them  with  vitality.  "Now  a  general  dissatisfac- 
12* 


274:  THE   CONSTITUTION   OF   THE   STATE. 

tion  with  old  arrangements  is  a  sign  that  the  national 
character  requires  better  ones ;  and  for  the  people  in  pur 
suit  of  these  better  ones  to  have  organized  associations, 
maintained  lecturers,  and  for  session  after  session  to  have 
wearied  the  legislature  with  petitions — to  have  continued 
this,  too,  until  the  accumulated  force  of  opinion  has  be 
come  irresistible,  is  to  have  given  conclusive  proof  that 
the  change  brought  about  is  really  in  harmony  with  the 
wants  of  the  age.  The  new  institutions  do  not  now  ex 
press  an  exceptional  state  of  the  popular  mind,  but  ex 
press  its  habitual  state,  and  hence  are  certain  to  be  fitted 
to  it. 

;, 

§  12.  Here  then  is  encouragement  for  timid  reform 
ers.  Men  of  true  insight  need  none  of  these  detailed  con 
siderations  to  steady  their  convictions  by.  The  mathema 
tician  does  not  call  for  a  pair  of  compasses  to  test  a  proved 
theorem  with ;  nor  does  the  man  with  healthy  faith  wait 
for  more  evidence  after  he  hears  what  the  moral  law  says. 
It  is  enough  for  him  that  a  thing  is  right.  He  will  never 
believe  that  the  carrying  out  of  what  is  right  by  right 
means,  can  be  injurious.  And  this  is  the  only  spirit 
worthy  to  be  named  religious.  But  as,  unhappily,  the 
many  are  not  endowed  with  so  trusting  a  belief,  it  is  re 
quisite  to  back  the  dictates  of  equity  with  supplementary 
arguments.  The  moral  infidelity  of  the  expediency  school 
requires  meeting.  And  it  is  to  those  infected  by  it  that 
the  above  considerations  are  commended,  as  showing  that 
they  need  not  fear  to  exhibit  whatever  sympathy  with 
democratic  principles  they  possess — need  not  fear  to  throw 
their  energies  at  once  into  the  popular  cause,  for  that  when 
equitable  institutions  are  equitably  obtained,  they  must 
necessarily  prosper. 

§    13.     Thus   the   claim  deducible  from  the  law  of 


SUMMARY  OF  THE  ARGUMENT.          275 

equal  freedom — the  claim  possessed  by  each  citizen  to  like 
political  power  with  the  rest — is  not  counterbalanced  by. 
any  of  those  prudential  considerations  commonly  urged 
against  it.  We  find  that  so  long  as  selfishness  makes  gov 
ernment  needful  at  all,  it  must  make  every  government 
corrupt,  save  one  in  which  all  men  are  represented.  The 
assertion  that  conceding  universal  suffrage  would  be 
creating  a  comparatively  immoral  constituency,  proves  to 
be  quite  unwarrantable;  seeing  that  all  classes  are  im 
moral,  and,  when  numbers  and  circumstances  are  taken  into 
account,  apparently  in  an  equal  degree.  A  glance  at  the 
evidence  shows  that  popular  ignorance  also  is  a  two- 
edged  objection;  for,  in  the  knowledge  which  may  be 
supposed  needful  for  the  right  use  of  votes,  the  mass  of 
those  inside  the  pale  of  the  constitution  are  about  as  defi 
cient  as  those  outside  of  it.  The  argument  that  purely 
representative  institutions  have  been  tried  and  have  failed, 
is  not  only  based  upon  inapplicable  instances,  but  would 
prove  nothing  if  substantiated.  Lastly,  in  this,  as  in  other 
cases,  it  turns  out  that  the  possibility  of  fulfilling  the  in 
junctions  of  the  moral  law  is  proportionate  to  the  advance 
men  have  made  toward  the  moral  state ;  political  arrange 
ments  inevitably  adjusting  themselves  to  the  popular 
character.  So  that  whilst  we  may  say  to  the  ardent  dem 
ocrats — "  Be  sure  that  a  democracy  will  be  attained  when 
ever  the  people  are  good  enough  for  one " — we  may  on 
the  other  hand  say  to  those  of  little  faith — "  Fear  not  that 
a  democracy,  when  peacefully  attained,  can  be  attained 


rO       f  vy»      r      vr 
276  THE   DUTY   OF   THE    STATE. 


CIIAPTEK    XXI. 

. 

,-      '   •-•    'v 

THE    DUTY    OF   THE    STATE. 

>§  1.  As  already  said  (pp.  230  and  231),  morality 
/Stands  toward  government  only  in  the  nature  of  a  limita- 
l  tion — behaves  negatively  with  regard  to  it,  not  positive- 
Jly — replies  to  all  inquiries  by  silently  indicating  the  con 
ditions  of  existence,  constitution,  and  conduct,  under 
which  alone  it  may  be  ethically  tolerated.  And  thus,  ig 
noring  government  altogether,  the  moral  law  can  give  us 
no  direct  information  as  to  what  a  government  ought  to 
do — can  merely  say  what  it  ought  not  to  do.  That  we 
are  left  •with  no  precise  knowledge  beyond  this,  may  in 
deed  be  inferred  from  a  preceding  chapter.  For  if,  as  was 
shown,  every  man  has  a  right  to  secede  from  jthe  state,  and 
if,  as  a  consequence,  the  state  must  be  regarded  as  a  body 
of  men  voluntarily  associated,  there  remains  nothing  to 
distinguish  it  in  the  abstract  from  any  other  incorporated 
society — nothing  to  determine  its  specific  function ;  and 
we  may  conceive  its  members  assigning  to  it  any  function 
that  does  not  involve  a  breach  of  the*moral  law. 

Immediate  guidance  in  this  matter  being  thus  impossi 
ble,  we  must  follow  such  indirect  ways  of  arriving  at  the 
truth  as  are  open  to  us.  The  question  is  no  longer  one  of 
pure  ethics,  and  is  therefore  incapable  of  solution  by  any 
exact  methods :  approximative  ones  only  are  available. 
Fortunately  there  are  several  of  these ;  and  converging  as 
they  do  to  the  same  conclusion,  that  conclusion  assumes 
something  like  the  character  of  certainty.  Let  us  now 
successively  employ  them. 

§  2.  Good,  and  perfect,  and  complete,  are  words  ap 
plicable  to  whatever  is  thoroughly  fitted  to  its  purpose ; 


WHAT   IS    IT   TO   BE   MORAL?  277 

and  by  the  word  moral  we  signify  the  same  property  in  a  > 
man.  A  thing  which  entirely  answers  its  end  cannot  be  > 
improved ;  and  a  man  whose  nature  leads  him  to  a  spon 
taneous  fulfilment  of  the  Divine  will  cannot  be  conceived 
better.  To  be  quite  self-sufficing — to  have  powers  exactly 
commensurate  with  what  ought  to  be  done,  is  to  be  or 
ganically  moral.  Given  the  ordained  object — happiness ; 
given  the  conditions  under  which  this  happiness  is  to  be 
compassed ;  and  perfection  consists  in  the  possession  of 
faculties  exactly  adapted  to  these  conditions :  whilst  the 
moral  law  is  simply  a  statement  of  that  line  of  conduct  by 
which  the  conditions  are  satisfied.  v  Hence  to  the  rightly- 
constituted  man  all  external  help  is  needless — detrimental 
even.  Just  as  the  healthy  body  wants  no  crutch,  tonic, 
or  stimulus,  but  has  within  itself  the  means  of  doing 
every  thing  required  of  it,  so  the  normally-developed  char 
acter  asks  no  artificial  aids ;  and  indeed  repudiates  them 
as  preoccupying  the  sphere  for  the  exercisq  .of  faculties 
which  the  hypothesis  supposes  it  to  have.  [^When,  on  the 
other  hand,  man's-  constitution  and  the  conditions  of  his 
existence  are  not  in  harmony,  there  arise  external  agencies 
to  supply  the  place  of  deficient  internal  faculties.^  And 
these  temporary  substitutes  being  supplementary  to  the 
faculties,  and  assisting  the  imperfect  man  as  they  do  to 
fulfil  the  law  of  his  being — the  moral  law,  as  we  call  it — 
obtain  a  certain  reflex  authority  from  that  law,  varying 
with  the  degree  in  which  they  subserve  its  requirements. 
Whatever  may  be  its  special  function,  it  is  clear  that 
government  is  one  of  these  artificial  aids;  and  the  most 
important  of  them.  J  "^ 

Or  the  case  may  perhaps  be  more  clearly  stated  thus  : 
— If  government  has  any  duty  at  all,  that  duty  must  be 
to  perform  a  service  of  some  kind — to  confer  a  benefit. 
But  every  possible  benefit  or  service  which  can  be  ren 
dered  to  a  man  is  comprehended  under  the  general  expres- 


278  THE   DUTY   OF   THE   STATE. 


sion  of  assisting  him  to  fulfil  the  law  of  his  being. 
Whether  you  feed  the  hungry,  or  cure  the  diseased,  or 
defend  the  weak,  or  curb  the  vicious,  you  do  but  enable 
or  constrain  them  to  conform  to  the  conditions  of  complete 
happiness  more  nearly  than  they  would  otherwise  do. 
And  causing  conformity  to  the  conditions  of  complete 
happiness  is  causing  conformity  to  the  moral  law.  If, 
therefore,  all  benefits  that  can  be  conferred  on  men  are 
aids  to  the  fulfilment  of  the  moral  law,  the  benefits  to  be 
conferred  by  government  must  be  of  this  nature. 

So  much  being  conceded,  let  us  next  inquire  how  the 
moral  law  may  be  most  essentially  subserved.  Practica 
bility  manifestly  underlies  performance.  That  which 
makes  an  act  feasible  must  take  precedence  of  the  act  itself. 
Before  the  injunction  —  Do  this,  there  necessarily  comes 
the  postulate  —  It  can  be  done.  Before  establishing  a 
code  .for  the  right  exercise  of  faculties,  there  must  be 
established  the  condition  which  makes  the  exercise  of  fac 
ulties  possible.  Now,  this  condition  which  makes  the 
exercise  of  faculties  possible  is  —  power  to  pursue  the  ob 
jects  on  which  thej^are^to  be  exercised  —  the  objects  of 
desire  ;  and  this_is^wjia^we  otherwise  call  liberty  of  action 
—  freedom.  But  that  which  makes  the  exercise  of  facul 
ties  possible,  is  that  which  makes  the  fulfilment  of  the 
moral  law  possible.  And  freedom  being  thus  the  grand 
prerequisite  to  the  fulfilment  of  the  moral  law,  it  follows 
that  if  a  man  is  to  be  helped  in  fulfilling  of  the  moral  law, 
the  first  thing  to  be  done  is  to  secure  to  him  this  all-essen 
tial  freedom.  This  aid  must  come  before  any  other  aid  —  • 
is,  in  fact,  that  which  renders  any  other  aid  practicable  ; 
for  no  faculty  to  which  liberty  of  action  is  denied  can  be 
assisted  in  the  performance  of  its  function  until  liberty  of 
action  has  been  restored.  Of  all  institutions,  therefore, 
which  the  imperfect  man  sets  up  as  supplementary  to  his 
nature,  the  chief  one  must  have  for  its  office  to  guarantee 


MEN   GEOW   INTO   POLITICAL   EELATIONS.  279 

j  his  freedom.  But  the  freedom  that  can  be  guaranteed  to 
each  is  bounded  by  the  like  freedom  to  be  guaranteed 
to  all  others.  This  is  necessitated  both  by  the  moral 
law  and  by  the  simultaneous  claims  made  upon  the 
institution  itself  by  its  clients.  Alienee  we  must  in 
fer  that  it  is  the  function  of  this  chief  institution  which 
we  call  a  government,  to  uphold  the  law  of  equal 
freedom.  A 

To  determine  the  duty  of  the  state  by  reverting  to  a 
supposed  understanding  entered  into  by  the  founders  of 
society — a  social  contract — we  have  already  seen  to  be  im- 
^ra^ticablejp.  222).  Men  did  not  deliberately  establish 
political  arrangements,  but  grew  into  them  unconsciously^ 
— probably  had  n6  cflnc'eption  oi  an  associated  concTition 
until  they  found  themselves  in.  it.  Moreover,  were  the 
hypothesis  of  an  original  agreement  reasonable,  it  could 
not  help  us ;  for  it  would  be  folly  to  assume  that  the 
duties  imposed  by  a  horde  of  savages  on  their  chief,  or 
council  of  chiefs,  must  necessarily  be  the  duties  of  govern 
ments  throughout  all  time.  J  Nevertheless,  if,  instead  of 
speculating  as  to  what  might  have  happened  during  the 
infancy  of  civilization,  we  consider  what  must  have  hap 
pened,  something  may  be  learnt.  On  turning  to  page  226, 
the  reader  will  find  it  argued  at  length  that  for  men  to 
have  remained  in  the  associated  state  implies  that  on  the 
whole  they  found  it  preferable  to  the  isolated  one ;  which 
means  that  they  obtained  a  greater  sum  total  of  gratifica 
tion  under  it ;  which  means  that  it  afforded  them  fuller 
exercise  for  their  faculties ;  which  means  that  it  offered  a 
safer  guarantee  for  such  exercise — more  security  for  their 

j claims  to  life  and  property  ;  that  is,  for  their  rights.  But 
if  men  could  have  continued  in  the  associated  state  only 
because  on  the  average  it  insured  their  rights  better  than 
the  previous  one,  then  the  insurance  of  their  rights  be 
comes  the  special  duty  which  society  in  its  corporate 


280  THE   DUTY   OF   THE   STATE. 

capacity  has  to  perform  toward  individuals.  That  func 
tion  by  which  a  thing  begins  to  exist  we  may  safely  con 
sider  its  all-essential  function.  Now,  whilst  those  many 
aids  to  gratification  which  civilization  has  brought  us 
were  yet  undeveloped,  society  must  have  existed  only 
because  it  protected  its  members  in  the  pursuit  of  those 
things  which  afford  satisfaction  to  the  faculties.  But  to 
protect  men  in  the  pursuit  of  those  things  which  afford 
satisfaction  to  the  faculties  is  to  maintain  their  rights. 
And  if  it  was  by  maintaining  the  rights  of  its  members 
that  society  began  to  be,  then  to  maintain  their  rights 
must  ever  be  regarded  as  its  primary  duty. 

Further  confirmation  may  be  drawn  from  the  universal 
practice  of  mankind  in  this  matter.  Widely  as  people 
have  differed  respecting  the  proper  bounds  of  legislative 
superintendence,  all  have  held  them  to  include  the  defence 
of  the  subject  against  *  aggression.  Whilst,  in  various 
countries  and  times,  a  hundred  different  functions  have 
been  assigned  to  the  state — whilst  there  have  probably 
been  no  two  governments  that  have  entirely  agreed  in  the 
number  and  nature  of  their  functions — whilst  the  things 
specially  attended  to  by  some  have  been  wholly  neglected 
by  others,  and  thereby  proved  non-essential,  there  is  one 
office— jthatof  protector — which  has  been  common  to 
them  all.  .Did.  ihis  lUci'siand  alone  it  might  by  a  stretch 
of  incredulity  be  construed  into  an  accident.  But  coincid 
ing  as  it  does  with  the  foregoing  inferences  drawn  from 
the  nature  of  man's  constitution  and  the  necessary  origin 
of  society,  we  may  safely  take  it  as  a  further  evidence  that 
the  duty  of  the  state  is — to  protect — to  enforce  the  law  of 
equal  freedom ;  to  maintain  men's  rights,  or,  as  we  com 
monly  express  it — to  administer  justice. 

§  3.  The  question — What  is  the  thing  to  be  done 
by  a  government  ?  being  answered,  there  arises  the  other- 


ADMINISTRATION   OF   JUSTICE.  281 

Which  is  the  most  efficient  mode  of  doing  it  ?  To  the 
proposition — the  administration  of  justice  is  the  special 
duty  of  the  state,  there  hangs  the  corollary — the  state  £_^--~ 
ougEt to  employ  tne  Dest  methods  of  fulfilling  that 
duty  ;  and  this  brings  us  to  the  inquiry— -~Wh at  arc  they  ? 
~T3y  our  hypothesis  the  connection  of  each  individual 
with  the  community  as  politically  organized,  must  be 
voluntary.  In  virtue  of  its  very  office  an  institution 
which  proposes  to  guarantee  a  man's  freedom  to  exercise 
his  faculties,  can  only  tender  its  services  to  him ;  cannot 
coerce  him  into  the  acceptance  of  them.  If  it  does  it 
becomes  self-contradicting — violates  that  very  freedom 
which  it  proposes  to  maintain.  Citizenship  then  being 
willingly  assumed,  AVC  must  inquire  what  agreement  is 
thereby  tacitly  entered  into  between  the  state  and  its 
members.  Two  things  are  conceivable.  There  may 
either  be  an  understanding  that  whoever  applies  to  the 
judicial  power  for  assistance  shall  defray  the  costs  there 
upon  incurred  by  it  on  his  behalf,  or  it  may  be  provided 
that  the  payment, of  a  constant  contribution  toward  tte 
expenses  of  this  judicial  power  shall  entitle  the  contributor 
to  its  services  whenever  he  needs  them.  The  first  of  these 
arrangements  does  not  seem  altogether  practicable ;  the 
other  is  one  to  which  existing  systems  partially  assimilate. 
In  either  case,  however,  it  is  taken  for  granted  that  the 
parties  will  duly  fulfil  their  promises ;  that  equivalents  of 
protection  and  taxation  shall  be  exchanged ;  that,  on  the 
one  side,  if  the  individual  chooses  to  avail  himself  of  state 
guardianship,  he  shall  not  refuse  his  fair  share  of  state 
burdens;  and  on  the  other,  that  when  the  state  has 
imposed  the  burdens  it  shall  not  withhold  the  guar 
dianship. 

Self-evident  as  is  this  interpretation  of  the  agreement, 
which  citizenship  presupposes,  judicial  practice  is  but 
little  guided  by  it.  Our  system  of  jurisprudence  takes  a 


282  THE   DUTY   OF   THE   STATE. 

very  one-sided  view  of  the  matter.  It  is  indeed  stringent 
enough  in  enforcing  the  claim  of  the  state  against  the  sub 
ject  ;  but  as  to  the  reciprocal  claim  of  the  subject  against 
the  state  it  is  comparatively  careless.  That  it  recognizes  the 
title  of  the  tax-payer  to  protection  is  true  ;  but  it  is  also 
true  that  it  does  this  but  partially.  From  certain  infringe 
ments  of  rights,  arbitrarily  classed  as  criminal,  it  is  ready 
to  defend  every  complainant ;  but  against  others,  not  so 
classed,  it  leaves  every  one  to  defend  himself.  The  most 
trifling  injury,  if  inflicted  in  a  specified  manner,  is  cogniza 
ble  by  the  magistrate,  and  redress  may  be  obtained  free  of 
charge;  but  if  otherwise  inflicted,  the  injury,  no  matter 
how  serious,  must  be  passively  borne,  unless  the  sufferer 
has  plenty  of  money  and  a  sufficiency  of  daring.  Let  a 
man  have  his  hat  knocked  over  his  eyes,  and  the  law  will 
zealously  espouse  his  cause — will  mulct  his  assailant  in  a 
fine  and  costs,  and  will  do  this  without  charge.  But  if, 
instead  of  having  been  bonneted,  he  has  been  wrongfully 
imprisoned,  he  is  politely  referred  to  a  solicitor,  with  the 
information  that  the  offence  committed  against  him  is 
actionable :  which  means,  that  if  rich  he  may  play  double 
or  quits  with  Fate  ;  and  that  if  poor  he  must  go  without 
even  this  chance  of  compensation.  Against  picking  of 
pockets,  as  ordinarily  practised,  the  ruling  power  grants 
its  lieges  gratuitous  protection ;  but  pockets  may  be 
picked  in  various  indirect  ways,  and  it  will  idly  look  on 
unless  costly  means  are  taken  to  interest  it.  It  will  rush 
to  the  defence  of  one  who  has  been  deprived  of  a  few 
turnips  by  a  half-starved  tramp ;  but  as  to  the  estate  on 
which  these  turnips  grew,  that  may  be  stolen  without 
risk,  so  long  as  the  despoiled  owner  is  left  friendless  and 
penniless.*  Some  complaints  need  only  to  be  whispered, 
and  it  forthwith  plays  the  parts  of  constable,  lawyer, 

*  It  is  true  that  a  plaintiff  who  can  swear  that  he  is  not  worth  £5  may 
sue  in  formd  paupcris.    But  this  privilege  is  almost  a  dead  letter.    Actions 


IT   FAILS   TO   DO   ITS   PKOPEK   WOEK.  283 

judge,  and  gaoler ;  whilst  to  others  it  turns  a  deaf  ear 
unless  they  are  made  through  its  bribed  hangers-on.  Now 
it  is  the  injured  man's  champion ;  and  now  it  throws  dowii 
its  weapons  to  sit  as  umpire,  whilst  oppressor  and  op 
pressed  run  a  tilt  at  each  other.  Over  such  and  such  por 
tions  of  a  citizen's  rights  it  mounts  guard  and  cries — 
"  Who  goes  there  ?  "  to  every  intruder ;  but  upon  the  rest 
any  one  may  trample  without  fear  of  being  challenged  by  it. 
To  a  man  with  perceptions  unblunted  by  custom,  this 
mode  of  carrying  out  the  agreement  subsisting  between 
himself  and  the  state,  would  seem  strange  enough.  It  is 
not  impossible  that  he  might  call  the  transaction  a  swindle ; 
might  argue  that  his  property  had  been  taken  from  him 
under  false  pretences.  "  To  what  purpose,"  he  might  ask, 
"  did  I  submit  myself  to  your  laws,  if  I  am  now  to  be 
denied  the  advantages  promised  in  return  ?  Have  I  not 
complied  with  all  the  stipulations  ?  You  demanded  alle 
giance,  and  I  gave  it.  You  said  money  was  needful,  and  I 
paid  the  uttermost  farthing  of  your  exactions,  heavy  as 
they  were.  You  required  me  to  fulfil  certain  civil  func 
tions,  and  I  fulfilled  them  cheerfully.  Yet  now  when  I 
ask  you  to  give  me  that  for  which  I  made  these  sacrifices, 
you  shuffle.  I  supposed  you  were  to  act  the  part  of  an 
Argus-eyed  and  Briareus-armed  guardian,  ever  watching 
over  my  interests,  ever  ready  to  step  in  and  defend  them; 
so  that  whether  sleeping  or  waking,  absorbed  in  business 
or  immersed  in  pleasure,  I  might  have  the  gratifying  con 
sciousness  of  being  carefully  shielded  from  injury.  Now, 
however,  I  find,  not  only  that  my  rights  may  be  trespassed 
upon  in  many  ways  without  attracting  your  notice,  but 
that  even  when  I  tell  you  I  have  been  wronged,  and 
demand  your  interposition,  you  shut  the  door  in  my  face? 
and  will  not  listen  until  I  have  exorbitantly  feed  some  of 

so  instituted  are  usually  found  to  fail,  because  those  who  conduct  them, 
having  to  plead  gratuitously,  plead  carelessly. 


284:  THE   DUTY   OF   THE   STATE. 

the  servants  who  have  access  to  your  private  ear.  What 
am  I  to  understand  by  this  ?  Is  it  that  your  revenue  is 
insufficient  to  defray  the  cost  of  dispensing  justice  in  all 
cases  ?  If  so,  why  not  say  as  much,  and  let  us  increase 
it  ?  Is  it  that  you  cannot  accomplish  what  you  profess  ? 
If  so,  declare  candidly  what  you  are  able  to  do,  and  what 
not.  But  at  any  rate  let  us  have  some  intelligible  under 
standing,  and  not  this  jumble  of  contradictions — this  con 
flict  of  promise  and  performance — this  taking  of  the  pay 
without  doing  the  duty." 

§  4.  That  men  should  sit  down  so  apathetically  as 
they  do  under  the  present  corrupt  administration  of  jus 
tice,  is  not  a  little  remarkable.  That  we,  with  all  our 
jealousy  of  abuses;  with  all  our  opportunities  of  canvass 
ing,  blaming,  and  amending  the  acts  of  the  legislature*; 
with  all  our  readiness  to  organize  and  agitate ;  with  the 
Anti-Corn  Law,  Slavery- Abolition,  and  Catholic-Emanci 
pation  victories  fresh  in  remembrance ;  that  we,  the  inde 
pendent,  determined,  self-ruling  English,  should  daily  be 
hold  the  giant  abominations  of  our  judicial  system,  and 
yet  do  nothing  to  rectify  them,  is  really  quite  incompre 
hensible.  It  is  not  as  though  the  facts  were  disputed ;  all 
men  are  agreed  upon  them.  The  dangers  of  law  are  pro 
verbial.  The  names  of  its  officers  are  used  as  synonymes 
for  trickery  and  greediness.  The  decisions  of  its  courts 
are  typical  of  chance.  In  all  companies  you  hear  but  one 
opinion,  and  each  person  confirms  it  by  a  fresh  illustra 
tion.  Now  you  are  informed  of  £300  having  been  ex 
pended  in  the  recovery  of  forty  shillings'  worth  of  prop 
erty  ;  and  again  of  a  cause  that  was  lost  because  an  af 
firmation  could  not  be  received  in  place  of  an  oath.  A 
right-hand  neighbour  can  tell  you  of  a  judge  who  allowed 
an  indictment  to  be  objected  to,  on  the  plea  that  the 
words,  "  in  the  year  of  our  Lord,"  were  not  inserted  be- 


COEKUPT   ADMINISTRATION   OF   JUSTICE.  285 

fore  the  date ;  and  another  to  your  left  narrates  how  a 
thief  lately  tried  for  stealing  a  guinea-pig  was  acquitted, 
because  a  guinea-pig  was  shown  to  be  a  kind  of  rat,  and 
a  rat  could  not  be  property.  At  one  moment  the  story  is 
of  a  poor  man  whose  rich  enemy  has  deliberately  ruined 
him  by  tempting  him  into  litigation ;  and  at  the  next  it  is 
of  a  child  who  has  been  kept  in  prison  for  six  weeks,  in 
default  of  sureties  for  her  appearance  as  witness  against 
one  who  had  assaulted  her.*  This  gentleman  has  been 
cheated  out  of  half  his  property,  but  dared  not  attempt 
to  recover  it  for  fear  of  losing  more ;  whilst  his  less  pru 
dent  companion  can  parallel  the  experience  of  him  who 
said  that  he  had  only  twice  been  on  the  verge  of  ruin ; 
once  when  he  had  lost  a  law-suit,  and  once  when  he  had 
gained  one.  On  all  sides  you  are  told  of  trickery  and  op 
pression,  and  revenge,  committed  in  the  name  of  justice ; 
of  wrongs  endured  for  want  of  money  wherewith  to  pur 
chase  redress;  of  rights  unclaimed  because  contention 
with  the  powerful  usurper  was  useless ;  of  chancery-suits 
that  outlasted  the  lives  of  the  suitors ;  of  fortunes  swal 
lowed  up  in  settling  a  title  ;  of  estates  lost  by  an  informal 
ity.  And  then  comes  a  catalogue  of  victims — of  those 
who  have  trusted  and  been  deceived;  gray-headed  men 
whose  hardly-earned  savings  went  to  fatten  the  attorney ; 
threadbare  and  hollow-cheeked  insolvents  who  lost  all  in 
the  attempt  to  get  their  due ;'  some  who  had  been  reduced 
to  subsist  on  the  charity  of  friends ;  others  who  had  died 
the  death  of  a  pauper ;  with  not  a  few  whose  anxieties 
had  produced  insanity,  or  who  in  their  desperation  had 
committed  suicide.  Yet,  whilst  all  parties  echo  each  oth 
ers'  exclamations  of  disgust,  these  iniquities  continue  un 
checked  ! 

§   5.     There  are  not  wanting,  however,  men  who  de- 
*  The  case  occurred  at  Winchester  in  July,  1849. 


286  THE   DUTY   OF   THE    STATE. 

fend  this  state  of  things — who  actually  argue  that  gov 
ernment  should  perform  but  imperfectly  what  they  allow 
to  be  its  special  function.  Whilst,  on  the  one  hand,  they 
admit  that  administration  of  justice  is  the  vital  necessity 
of  civilized  life,  they  maintain,  on  the  other,  that  justice 
may  be  •administered  too  well !  "  For,"  say  they,  "  were 
law  cheap,  all  men  would  avail  themselves  of  it.  Did 
there  exist  no  difficulty  in  obtaining  justice,  justice  would 
be  demanded  in  every  case  of  violated  rights.  Ten  times 
as  many  appeals  would  be  made  to  the  authorities  as 
now.  Men  would  rush  into  legal  proceedings  on  the 
slightest  provocation;  and  litigation  would  be  so  enor 
mously  increased  as  to  make  the  remedy  worse  than  the 
disease." 

Such  is  the  argument ;  an  argument  involving  either 
a  gross  absurdity  or  an  unwarrantable  assumption.  For 
observe :  when  this  great  multiplication  of  law  proceed 
ings  under  a  gratuitous  administration  of  justice  is  urged 
as  a  reason  why  things  should  remain  as  they  are,  it  is 
implied  that  the  evils  attendant  upon  the  rectification  of 
all  wrongs,  would  be  greater  than  are  the  evils  attendant 
upon  submission  to  those  wrongs.  Either  the  great  ma 
jority  of  civil  aggressions  must  be  borne  in  silence  as 
now,  or  must  be  adjudicated  upon  as  then ;  and  the  alle 
gation  is  that  the  first  alternative  is  preferable.  But  if 
ten  thousand  litigations  are  worse  than  ten  thousand  in 
justices,  then  one  litigation  is  worse  than  one  injustice. 
Which  means  that,  as  a  general  principle,  an  appeal  to  the 
law  for  protection  is  a  greater  evil  than  the  trespass  com 
plained  of.  Which  means  that  it  would  be  better  to  have 
no  administration  of  justice  at  all !  If  for  the  sake  of  es 
caping  this  absurdity  it  be  assumed  that,  as  things  now 
are,  all  great  wrongs  are  rectified — that  the  costliness  of 
law  prevents  insignificant  ones  only  from  being  brought 
into  court,  and  that  consequently  the  above  inference  can- 


EFFECT   OF   MAKING   JUSTICE   ACCESSIBLE.  287 

not  be  drawn — then,  either  denial  is  given  to  the  obvious 
fact  that,  by  the  poverty  they  inflict,  many  of  the  great 
est  wrongs  incapacitate  their  victims  from  obtaining  re 
dress,  and  to  the  obvious  fact  that  the  civil  injuries  suf 
fered  by  the  masses,  though  absolutely  small,  are  relatively 
great ;  or  else  it  is  taken  for  granted  that  on  nine-tenths 
of  the  population,  who  are  too  poor  to  institute  legal  pro 
ceedings,  no  civil  injuries  of  moment  are  ever  inflicted ! 

Nor  is  this  all.  It  is  not  necessarily  true  that  making 
the  law  easy  of  access  would  increase  litigation.  An  op 
posite  effect  might  be  produced.  The  prophecy  is  vitiated 
by  that  very  common  mistake  of  calculating  the  result  of 
some  new  arrangement  on  the  assumption  that  all  other 
things  would  remain  as  they  are.  It  is  taken  for  granted 
that  under  the  hypothetical  regime  just  as  many  trans 
gressions  would  occur  as  at  present.  Whereas  any  candid 
observer  can  see  that  most  of  the  civil  offences  now  com 
mitted,  are  committed  in  consequence  of  the  inefficiency 
of  our  judicial  system ; 

"  For  sparing  justice  feeds  iniquity." 

It  is  the  difficulty  that  he  knows  there  will  be  in  convict 
ing  him  which  tempts  the  knave  to  behave  knavishly. 
Were  not  the  law  so  expensive  and  so  uncertain,  dishon 
est  traders  would  never  risk  the  many  violations  of  it  they 
now  do.  The  trespasses  of  the  wealthy  against  the  poor 
would  be  rare,  were  it  not  that  the  aggrieved  have  practi 
cally  no  remedy.  Mark  how,  to  the  man  who  contem 
plates  wronging  his  fellow,  our  legal  system  holds  out 
promises  of  impunity.  Should  his  proposed  victim  be  one 
of  small  means,  there  is  the  likelihood  that  he  will  not 
be  able  to  carry  on  a  lawsuit:  here  is  encouragement. 
Should  he  possess  enough  money,  why,  even  then,  having, 
like  most  people,  a  great  dread  of  litigation,  he  will  prob 
ably  bear  his  loss  unresistingly :  here  is  further  encour- 


288  THE   DUTY   OF   THE    STATE. 

agement.  Lastly,  our  plotter  remembers  that,  should  his 
victim  venture  an  action,  judicial  decisions  are  very  much 
matters  of  accident,  and  that  the  guilty  are  often  rescued 
by  clever  counsel:  here  is  still  more  encouragement. 
And  so,  all  things  considered,  he  determines  to  chance  it. 
Now,  he  would  never  decide  thus  were  legal  protection 
efficient.  Were  the  administration  of  law  prompt,  gratu 
itous,  and  certain,  those  probabilities  and  possibilities 
which  now  beckon  him  on  to  fraudulent  acts  would  van 
ish.  Civil  injuries  wittingly  committed  would  almost 
cease.  Only  in  cases  where  both  parties  sincerely  believed 
themselves  right,  would  judicial  arbitration  be  called  for ; 
and  the  number  of  such  cases  is  comparatively  small. 
Litigation,  therefore,  so  far  from  increasing  on  justice  be 
ing  made  easy  of  obtainment,  would  probably  decrease. 

§  6.  But,  after  all,  it  is  not  the  setting  up  of  this  or 
that  system  of  jurisprudence  which  causes  the  intercourse 
of  men  with  each  other  to  be  equitable  or  otherwise. 
The  matter  lies  deeper.  As  with  forms  of  government,  so 
with  forms  of  law ;  it  is  the  national  character  that  de 
cides.  The  power  of  an  apparatus  primarily  depends,  not 
on  the  ingenuity  of  its  design,  but  on  the  strength  of  its 
materials.  Be  his  plan  never  so  well  devised — his  ar 
rangement  of  struts,  and  ties,  and  bolts,  never  so  good — 
his  balance  of  forces  never  so  perfect — yet  if  our  engineer 
has  not  considered  whether  the  respective  parts  of  his 
structure  will  bear  the  strain  to  be  put  upon  them,  we 
must  call  him  a  bungler.  Similarly  with  the  institution- 
maker.  If  the  people  with  whom  he  has  to  deal  are  not 
of  the  requisite  quality,  no  cleverness  in  his  contrivance 
will  avail  any  thing.  Let  us  never  forget  that  institutions 
are  made  of  men ;  that  men  are  the  struts,  ties,  and  bolts, 
out  of  which  they  are  framed;  and  that,  dovetail  and 
brace  them  together  as  we  may,  it  is  their  nature  which 


INSTITUTIONS   ARE   MADE   OF   MEN.  289 

must  finally  determine  whether  the  institutions  can  stand. 
Always  there  will  be  some  line  of  least  resistance,  along 
which,  if  the  humanity  they  are  wrought  out  of  be  not 
strong  enough,  they  will  give  way;  and  having  given 
way,  will  sink  down  into  a  less  trying  attitude.  Thus  it 
is,  amongst  other  things,  with  judicial  mechanisms.  No 
matter  how  admirably  devised,  their  results  will  be  good 
only  in  proportion  as  the  nation  is  good.  The  instrumen 
talities  by  which  they  are  to  act — -judges,  juries,  consta 
bles,  witnesses,  gaolers  and  the  rest — must  be  units  of  the 
people — will,  on  the  average,  be  marked  by  the  same  im 
perfections  as  the  people ;  and  though  the  system  they  are 
set  to  work  out  be  perfect,  yet  will  the  badness  of  their 
characters  degrade  its  acts  down  to  a  level  with  the  gen 
eral  conduct  of  society. 

That  justice  can  be  well  administered  only  in  propor 
tion  as  men  become  just,  is  a  fact  too^enerally  overlooked. 
" If  they  had  l^ut  trial  b)  jllfyl"  says  some  one,  moral 
izing  on  the  Russians'.  But  they  can't  have  it.  It  could 
not  exist  amongst  them.  Even  if  established  it  would 
not  work.  They  lack  that  substratum  of  honesty  and 
truthfulness  on  which  alone  it  can  stand.  To  be  of  use, 
this,  like  any  other  institution,  must  be  born  of  the  popu 
lar  character.  It  is  not  t.rial  by  jury  that  produces  jus 
tice,  but  it  is  the  sentiment  oj  justice  tnat  produces  trial 
by  jury,  as  the  organ  through^ which  it  is  to  act ;  and  the 
organ  will  be  inert  unless  the  sentiment  is  there.  These 
social  forms  which  we  regard  as  so  potential,  are  things 
of  quite  secondary  importance.  What  mattered  it  that 
the  Roman  plebeians  were  endowed  with  certain  privi 
leges,  when  the  patricians  prevented  them  from  exercising 
those  privileges  by  ill-treatment  carried  even  to  the  death  ? 
What  mattered  it  that  our  statute-book  contained  equita 
ble  provisions,  and  that  officers  were  appointed  to  enforce 
them,  when  there  needed  a  Magna  Charta  to  demand  that 
13 


290  THE   DUTY   OF   THE   STATE. 

justice  should  neither  be  sold,  denied^nor  delayed  ?  What 
/matters  it  even  now,  that  all  men  are  declared  equal  be- 

/  fore  the  law,  when  magistrates  are  swayed  by  class  sym 
pathies,  and  treat  a  gentleman  more  leniently  than  an  arti- 

\jsan  ?  If  we  think  that  we  can  rectify  the  relationships 
of  men  at  will,  we  deceive  ourselves.  What  Sir  James 
Mackintosh  says  of  constitutions — that  they  are  not  made, 
but  grow,  applies  to  all  social  arrangements.  It  is  not 
true  that  once  upon  a  time  men  said — "  Let  there  be  law; " 
and  there  was  law.  Administration  of  justice  was  origi 
nally  impracticable,  Utopian ;  and  has  become  more  and 
more  practicable  only  as  men  have  become  less  savage. 
The  old  system  of  settling  disputes  by  personal  contest, 
and  the  new  system  of  settling  them  by  state  arbitration, 
have  coexisted  throughout  all  ages ;  the  one  little  by  lit 
tle  usurping  the  place  of  the  other,  outgrowing  it.  It  was 
only  after  some  advance  had  been  made  that  the  civil 
power  could  get  recognized  at  all  as  a  maintainer  of  rights. 
The  feudal  baron  with  castle  and  retainers  maintained  his 
own  rights,  and  would  have  considered  himself  disgraced 
by  asking  legal  aid.  Even  after  he  had  agreed  to  regard 
his  suzerain  as  umpire,  it  was  still  in  the  lists,  and  by  the 
strength  of  his  arm  and  his  lance,  that  he  made  good  his 
cause.  And  when  we  remember  that  equally  amongst 
lords  and  labourers  this  practice  lingers  even  now — that 
-we  have  still  duels,  which  it  is  thought  dishonourable  for 
a  gentleman  to  avoid  by  applying  to  a  magistrate — that 
we  have  still  pugilistic  fights,  which  the  people  try  to  hide 
from  the  police — we  are  taught  that  it  is  impossible  for  a 
judicial  system  to  become  efficient  faster  than  men  be 
come  good.  It  is  only  after  public  morality  has  gained  a 
certain  ascendancy,  that  the  civil  power  gets  strong 
enough  to  perform  its  simplest  functions.  Before  this  it 
cannot  even  put  down  banditti ;  border  forays  continue  in 
spite  of  it ;  and  it  is  bearded  in  its  very  strongholds,  as, 


amongst  ourselves,  by  the  thieves  of  Whitefriars  but  two 
centuries  ago.  Under  early  governments  the  officers  of 
law  are  less  friends  than  enemies.  Legal  forms  are  habit 
ually  used  for  purposes  of  oppression.  Causes  are  decided 
by  favouritism,  bribery,  and  back-stairs  intrigue.  The 
judicial  apparatus  breaks  down  under  the  work  it  has  to 
do,  and  shows  us  in  a  Jonathan  Wild,  a  Judge  Jeffries, 
and  even  a  Lord  Chancellor  Bacon,  how  inevitably  its 
several  parts  are  rendered  inoperative  by  a  generally-dif 
fused  wickedness. 

Of  course  the  efficiency  of  present  and  future  systems 
of  jurisprudence  must  be  determined  by  the  same  influ 
ences.  Of  our  own  legal  arrangements  we  may  say,  what 
Emerson  has  well  said  of  institutions  generally — that  they 
are  about  as  good  as  the  characters  of  men  permit  them 
to  be.  When  we  read  of  Orange  magistrates  who  become 
aggressors  rather  than  protectors  •  of  policemen  who  con 
spire  with  each  other  to  obtain  convictions  that  they  may 
be  promoted ;  and  of  the  late  Palace  Court,  whose  officers 
habitually  favoured  the  plaintiff  with  the  view  of  inducing 
men  to  enter  suits  there,  we  find  that  now,  as  of  old,  judi 
cial  protection  is  vitiated  by  the  depravity  of  the  age. 
Nevertheless  it  is  probable  that  we  are  ripe  for  something 
better  than  we  have.  The  universal  disgust  with  which 
law  is  regarded,  may  be  taken  as  evidence  of  this — as  evi 
dence,  moreover,  that  a  change  is  at  hand.  But  it  is  n<*fr 
likely  that  the  mode  of  administering  justice  lately  pointed 
out  as  the  proper  one  is  immediately  feasible ;  seeing  that 
men,  by  not  having  yet  even  recognized  it  as  theoretically 
right,  show  themselves  considerably  below  the  state  to 
which  it  is  natural.  This,  however,  is  no  reason  for  not 
advocating  its  adoption.  For,  what  was  said  in  the  last 
chapter  respecting  an  equitable  form  of  government,  may 
be  here  said  respecting  an  equitable  system  of  law ;  that 
the  power  quietly  to  establish  it  is  the  measure  of  its  prac 
ticability. 


292  THE   DUTY   OF   THE    STATE.     V  .b 

§  7.  By  dispersing  that  haze  of  political  supersti 
tion  through  which  the  state  and  its  appendages  loom  so 
large,  the  foregoing  considerations  suggest  a  somewhat 
startling  question.  For  if  when  men's  savageness  and 
dishonesty  render  the  administration  of  justice  most  neces 
sary,  it  is  impossible ;  if  it  becomes  possible  only  in  pro 
portion  as  men  themselves  become  just ;  and  if  that  same 
universal  uprightness,  which  permits  the  administration 
of  justice  to  become  perfect,  also  makes  it  needless,  as  it 
evidently  must,  then  we  may  naturally  ask — Can  the  state 
really  administer  justice  at  all  ?  Does  it,  looking  at  so 
ciety  as  a  whole,  secure  to  the  people  any  fuller  enjoyment 
of  their  rights  than  th&y  would  have  without  it  ?  May 
we  not  conclude  that  it  takes  away  from  men's  liberties  in 
one  direction,  as  much  as  it  gives  in  another  ?  Is  it  not  a 
mere  dead  mechanism  worked  by  a  nation's  moral  sense ; 
neither  adding  to,  nor  deducting  from,  the  force  of  that 
moral  sense ;  and  consequently  unable  to  alter  the  sum- 
total  of  its  eifects  ? 

A  strange  idea,  this,  some  will  think :  and  so  at  first 
sight  it  seems.  We  have  such  a  habit  of  regarding  gov 
ernment  in  its  protective  character,  and  forgetting  its  ag 
gressive  one,  that  to  ask  whether  the  rights  it  secures  are 
not  about  balanced  by  the  rights  it  violates,  seems  almost 
laughable.  Nevertheless  we  shall  find  that  on  drawing 
*ip  a  debtor  and  creditor  account,  the  absurdity  of  the 
doubt  disappears.  Passing  over  those  ruling  powers  of 
the  East,  which,  in  return  for  the  small  amount  of  security 
they  guarantee,  are  in  the  habit  of  confiscating,  under  one 
pretence  or  other,  any  property  not  efficiently  concealed 
by  the  unfortunate  owners,  and  which,  in  some  cases,  push 
their  exactions  so  far  as  to  have  to  give  back  for  seed  in 
the  spring  a  part  of  that  crop  they  had  taken  from  the 
husbandman  at  the  previous  harvest — passing  over,  too, 
those  middle-age  systems  of  government  under  which  pro- 


GOOD   AND   EVIL    OF   GOVERNMENTS    ESTIMATED.       293 

tection,  such  as  it  was,  had  to  be  purchased  by  the  resig 
nation  of  personal  freedom,  let  us  institute  as  favourable 
a  comparison  as  possible.  Let  us  take  the  relatively  good 
governments  we  now  know,  and  setting  down  on  the  one 
side  the  benefits  conferred,  and  on  the  other  the  evils  in 
flicted,  let  us  strike  a  balance  between  them.  Under  the 
head  of  obligations  may  be  entered  the  efficient  curb 
which  our  police  system  puts  upon  offences  against  person 
and  property ;  our  courts  of  law,  too,  with  all  their  de 
fects,  afford  a  partial  defence  against  civil  injuries  which 
needs  setting  down  in  the  estimate ;  and  to  these  must  be 
added  what  far  outweigh  them  both — that  sense  of  habit 
ual  security,  and  that  consequent  ability  to  fearlessly  carry 
on  the  business  of  life,  which  are  produced  by  the  mere 
presence  of  an  active  civil  power.  Even  after  deducting 
from  these  a  heavy  discount  on  the  score  of  shortcomings, 
there  unquestionably  remains  a  large  surplus  of  benefit  for 
w^hich  the  state  may  claim  credit.  Turn  we  now  to  the 
per  contra  statement.  As  the  first  item  on  the  list  there 
stands  that  gigantic  injustice  inflicted  upon  nineteen-twen- 
tieths  of  the  community  by  the  usurpation  of  the  soil — 
by  the  breach  of  their  rights  to  the  use  of  the  earth  (Chap. 
IX.).  For  this  the  civil  power  is  responsible — has  itself 
been  a  party  to  the  aggression — has  made  it  legal,  and 
still  defends  it  as  right.  Next  comes  the  trespass  commit 
ted  against  the  many  by  subordinating  them  to  the  few, 
and  forcing  them  to  obey  laws  to  which  their  consent  was 
never  asked.  Note  again  the  tyrannies  accompanying  na 
tional  defence — the  impressments  and  militia-drawings, 
the  continuous  abnegations  of  liberty  in  the  persons  of  sol 
diers  and  sailors,  ending  not  unfrequently  in  the  sacrifice 
of  their  lives.  Remember  also  how  our  rights  are  trenched 
upon  by  commercial  restrictions ;  and  how  men  are  not 
only  prevented  from  buying'  and  selling  where  they  please, 
but  are  debarred  from  following  certain  occupations  until 


294:  THE   DUTY    OF   THE   STATE. 

they  have  bought  government  permits.  Nor  let  us  forget 
the  penalties  that  until  lately  so  seriously  transgressed 
religious  freedom — penalties  which,  as  the  Anti-State- 
Church  Association  can  show,  have  by  no  means  disap 
peared.  And  all  these,  together  with  the  many  minor 
restrictions  hedging  us  about,  are  accompanied  by  those 
never-ceasing  incursions  made  upon  our  property  by  the 
tax-gatherer  and  the  officers  of  customs  and  excise,  by 
poor-rate  collectors  and  churchwardens.  Measuring 
wrongs,  as  we  must,  by  the  degree  in  which  they  limit  the 
exercise  of  faculties,  let  us  now  add  up  the  two  accounts 
and  contrast  their  sum-totals.  On  the  one  side  govern 
ment  partially  saves  us  (only  partially,  mind)  from  those 
assaults,  robberies,  murders,  cheatings,  and  kindred  inju 
ries,  to  which,  were  there  no  such  institution,  the  existing 
immorality  of  men  would  expose  us.  These  we  must  im 
agine  to  be  distributed  over  the  community  at  large,  and 
over  the  life  of  each  citizen,  and  then  conceive  to  what 
average  restriction  on  the  free  exercise  of  faculties  they 
would  be  equivalent.  On  the  other  side  government  it 
self  transgresses  men's  liberties  by  the  monopoly  of  land, 
by  the  usurpation  of  power,  by  restrictions  on  trade,  by 
the  slavery  and  death  of  thousands  of  soldiers,  by  the 
ruin  of  hundreds  it  ought  to  protect,  by  favouritism  to 
creeds  and  classes,  by  the  civil  functions  it  makes  impera 
tive,  by  petty  restraints  too  numerous  to  name,  but  above 
all  by  a  remorseless  taxation,  which,  affecting  seven-eights 
of  the  nation  as  it  does  by  abstracting  a  large  percentage 
from  earnings  already  insufficient  for  necessaries,  virtually 
obliterates,  in  great  measure,  the  spheres  needed  for  the 
development  of  their  natures.  We  have  now  to  suppose 
these  manifold  limitations  to  the  free  exercise  of  faculties 
averaged  like  the  others,  and  then  to  ask  ourselves  whether 
the  two  averages  are,  or  are  not,  equal.  Is  the  question 
after  all  so  very  irrational  ?  Is  not  the  answer  doubtful  ? 


LEGISLATION  CANNOT  CEEATE  MOEAL  FOECE.    295 

Nay,  indeed ;  consider  it  rightly  and  the  answer  is  not 
at  all  doubtful.  It  is  very  certain  that  government  can 
not  alter  the  total  amount  of  injustice  committed.  The 
absurdity  is  in  supposing  that  it  can — in  supposing  that 
by  some  ingenious  artifice  we  may  avoid  the  consequences 
of  our  own  natures.  The  civil  power  no  more  does  what 
to  the  careless  eye  it  seems  to  do,  than  the  juggler  really 
performs  his  apparent  miracles.  It  is  impossible  for  man 
to  create  force.  He  can  only  alter  the  mode  of  its  mani 
festations,  its  direction,  its  distribution.  The  power  that 
propels  his  steamboats  and  locomotives  is  not  of  his  mak 
ing;  it  was  all  lying  latent  in  the  coal.  He  telegraphs 
by  an  agent  set  free  during  the  oxidation  of  zinc ;  but  of 
which  no  more  is  obtained  than  is  due  to  the  number  of 
atoms  that  have  combined.  The  very  energy  he  expends 
in  moving  his  arm  is  generated  by  the  chemical  affinities 
of  the  food  he  eats.  In  no  case  can  he  do  any  thing  but 
avail  himself  of  dormant  forces.  This  is  as  true  in  ethics 
as  in  physics.  Moral  feeling  is  a  force — a  force  by  which 
men's  actions  are  restrained  within  certain  prescribed 
bounds ;  and  no  legislative  mechanism  can  increase  its  re 
sults  one  iota.  By  how  much  this  force  is  deficient,  by  so 
much  must  its  work  remain  undone.  In  whatever  degree 
we  lack  the  qualities  needful  for  our  state,  in  the  same 
degree  must  we  suffer.  Nature  will  not  be  cheated. 
Whoso  should  think  to  escape  the  influence  of  gravitation 
by  throwing  his  limbs  into  some  peculiar  attitude,  would 
not  be  more  deceived  than  are  those  who  hope  to  avoid 
the  weight  of  their  depravity  by  arranging  themselves 
into  this  or  that  form  of  political  organization.  Every  jot 
of  the  evil  must  in  one  way  or  other  be  borne — consciously 
or  unconsciously ;  either  in  a  shape  that  is  recognized,  or 
else  under  some  disguise.  No  philosopher's  stone  of  a 
constitution  can  produce  golden  conduct  from  leaden  in 
stincts.  No  apparatus  of  senators,  judges,  and  police, 
'tjlto  <~ 
-. 


THE   DUTY   OF   THE    STATE. 

can  compensate  for  the  want  of  an  internal  governing 
sentiment.  No  legislative  manipulation  can  eke  out  an 
insufficient  morality  into  a  sufficient  one.  ISTo  administra 
tive  sleight  of  hand  can  save  us  from  ourselves. 

But  must  not  this  imply  that  government  is  of  no 
use  whatever?  Not  at  all.  Although  unable  to  alter 
the  sum-total  of  injustice  to  be  supported,  it  can  still  al 
ter  its  distribution.  And  this  is  what  it  really  does.  By 
its  aid,  men  to  a  considerable  extent  equalize  the  evil 
they  have  to  bear — spread  it  out  more  uniformly  over 
the  whole  community,  and  over  the  life  of  each  citi 
zen.  Entire  freedom  to  exercise  the  faculties,  interrupted 
by  entire  deprivations  of  it,  and  marred  by  the  perpetual 
danger  of  these  deprivations,  is  exchanged  for  a  freedom 
on  which  the  restrictions  are  constant  but  partial.  In 
stead  of  those  losses  of  life,  of  limb,  or  of  the  means  of 
subsistence,  which,  under  a  state  of  anarchy,  all  are  liable 
to,  and  many  suffer,  a  political  organization  commits  uni 
versal  aggressions  of  a  comparatively  mild  type.  Wrongs 
that  were  before  occasional,  but  crushing,  are  now  unceas 
ing,  but  bearable.  The  system  is  one  of  mutual  assurance 
against  moral  disasters.  Just  as  men,  whilst  they  cannot 
prevent  fires  and  shipwrecks,  can  yet  guarantee  each  other 
against  ruin  from  these,  by  bearing  them  in  common,  and 
distributing  the  injuries  entailed  over  long  periods  of 
time ;  so,  although  by  uniting  together  for  judicial  pur 
poses  men  cannot  diminish  the  amount  of  injustice  to  be 
borne,  they  can,  and  do,  insure  themselves  against  its  oth 
erwise  fatal  results. 

§  8.  When  we  agreed  that  it  was  the  essential  func 
tion  of  the  state  to  protect — to  administer  the  law  of 
equal  freedom — to  maintain  men's  rights — we  virtually 
assigned  to  it  the  duty,  not  only  of  shielding  each  citizen 
from  the  trespasses  of  his  neighbours,  but  of  defending 


PROTECTION  FEOM   FOREIGN  AGGRESSION.  297 

him,  in  common  with  the  community  at  large,  against  for 
eign  aggressions.  An  invading  force  may  violate  people's 
rights  as  much  as,  or  far  more  than,  an  equal  body  of 
felons  ;  and  our  definition  requires  that  government  shall 
resist  transgression  in  the  one  case  as  much  as  in  the 
other.  Protection, — this  is  what  men  seek  by  political 
combination ;  and  whether  it  be  against  internal  or  exter 
nal  enemies  matters  not.  Unquestionably  war  is  immoral. 
But  so  likewise  is  the  violence  used  in  the  execution  of 
justice;  so  is  all  coercion.  Ethical  law  is  as  certainly 
broken  by  the  deeds  of  judicial  authorities  as  by  those  of 
a  defensive  army.  There  is,  in  principle,  no  difference 
whatever  between  the  blow  of  a  policeman's  baton  and 
the  thrust  of  a  soldier's  bayonet.  Both  are  infractions 
of  the  law  of  equal  freedom  in  the  persons  of  those  injured. 
In  either  case  we  have  force  sufficient  to  produce  submis 
sion  ;  and  it  matters  not  whether  that  force  be  employed 
by  a  man  in  red  or  by  one  in  blue.  Policemen  are  soldiers 
who  act  alone :  soldiers  are  policemen  who  act  in  unison. 
Government  employs  the  first  to  attack  in  detail  ten 
thousand  criminals  who  separately  make  war  upon  socie 
ty  ;  and  it  calls  in  the  last  when  threatened  by  a  like 
number  of  criminals  in  the  shape  of  drilled  troops.  Re 
sistance  to  foreign  foes  and  resistance  to  native  ones  hav 
ing  consequently  the  same  object — the  maintenance  of 
men's  rights,  and  being  effected  by  the  same  means — force, 
are  in  their  nature  identical,  and  no  greater  condemnation 
can  be  passed  upon  the  one  than  upon  the  other.  *  The 
doings  of  the  battle-field  merely  exhibit  in  a  concentrated 
form  that  immorality  which  is  inherent  in  government, 
and  attaches  to  all  its  functions.  What  is  so  manifest 
in  its  military  acts  is  true  of  its  civil  acts,  that  it  uses 
wrong  to  put  down  wrong. 

Defensive  warfare   (and  of  course  it  is  solely  to  this 
that  the  foregoing  argument  applies)  must  therefore  be 


298  THE  DUTY  OF  THE  STATE. 

tolerated  as  the  least  of  two  evils.  There  are  indeed 
some  who  unconditionally  condemn  it,  and  would  meet 
invasion  by  non-resistance.  To  such  there  are  several 
replies. 

First,  consistency  requires  them  to  behave  in  like  fash 
ion  to  their  fellow-citizens.  They  must  not  only  allow 
themselves  to  be  cheated,  assaulted,  robbed,  wounded, 
without  offering  active  opposition,  but  must  refuse  help 
from  the  civil  power;  seeing  that  they  who  employ  force 
by  proxy,  are  as  much  responsible  for  that  force  as  though 
they  employed  it  themselves. 

Again,  such  a  theory  makes  pacific  relationships  be 
tween  men  and  nations  look  needlessly  Utopian.  If  all 
agree  not  to  aggress,  they  must  as  certainly  be  at  peace 
with  each  other  as  though  they  had  all  agreed  not  to 
resist.  So  that,  whilst  it  sets  up  so  difficult  a  standard 
of  behaviour,  the  rule  of  non-resistance  is  not  one  whit 
more  efficient  as  a  preventive  of  war,  than  the  rule  of  non- 
aggression. 

Moreover  this  principle  of  non-resistance  is  not  dedu- 
cible  from  the  moral  law.  The  moral  law  says  —  Do  not 
aggress.  It  cannot  say  —  Do  not  resist  ;  for  to  say  this 
would  be  to  presuppose  its  own  precepts  broken.  As  ex 
plained  at  the  outset  (Chap.  I.),  Morality  describes  the 
conduct  of  perfect  men  ;  and  cannot  include  in  its  prem 
ises  circumstances  that  arise  from  imperfection.  That  rule 
which  attains  to  universal  sway  when  all  men  are  what 
they  ought  to  be,  must  be  the  right  rule,  must  it  not  ? 
And  that  rule  which  then  becomes  impossible  of  fulfilment 
must  be  the  wrong  one  ?  Well  ;  in  an  ideal  state  the  law 
of  non-aggression  is  obeyed  by  all  —  is  the  vital  principle 
of  every  one's  conduct  —  is  fully  carried  out,  reigns,  lives  ; 
whereas  in  such  a  state  the  law  of  non-resistance  neces 
sarily  becomes  a  dead  letter. 

Lastly,  it  can  be  shown  that  non-resistance  is  abso- 


THE   EBEOK   OF   NON-RESISTANCE.  299 

lutely  wrong.  We  may  not  carelessly  abandon  our  rights. 
We  may  not  give  away  our  birthright  for  the  sake  of 
peace.  If  it  be  a  duty  to  respect  other  men's  claims,  so 
also  is  it  a  duty  to  maintain  our  own.  That  which  is 
sacred  in  their  persons  is  sacred  in  ours  also.  Have  we 
not  a  faculty  which  makes  us  feel  and  assert  our  title  to 
freedom  of  action,  at  the  same  time  that,  by  a  reflex  pro 
cess,  it  enables  us  to  appreciate  the  like  title  in  our  fel 
lows  ?  Did  we  not  find  that  this  faculty  can  act  strongly 
on  behalf  of  others,  only  when  it  acts  strongly  on  our 
own  behalf  (p.  117)  ?  And  must  we  assume  that,  whilst 
its  sympathetic  promptings  are  to  be  diligently  listened 
to,  its  direct  ones  are  to  be  disregarded  ?  To  suppose 
this,  is  to  suppose  an  incurable  defect  in  our  moral  con 
stitution — is  to  suppose  that  the  very  sentiment  intended 
to  lead  us  will  itself  mislead  us.  ~No :  we  may  not  be 
passive  under  aggression.  In  the  due  maintenance  of  our 
claims  is  involved  the  practicability  of  all  our  duties. 
Without  liberty  of  action,  without  rights,  we  cannot 
fully  exercise  our  faculties ;  and  if  we  cannot  fully  exer 
cise  our  faculties ;  we  cannot  fulfil  the  Divine  will ;  and 
if  we  allow  ourselves  to  be  deprived  of  that  without 
which  we  cannot  fulfil  the  Divine  will,  we  virtually  neg-~ 
lect  that  will. 

But  how,  if  all  coercion  is  immoral  ?  Will  it  not  fol 
low  that  it  is  immoral  to  use  violence  in  opposing  a  tres 
passer?  Certainly.  Then  either  alternative  is  wrong? 
Just  so :  the  law  of  right  conduct  has  been  broken,  and 
this  dilemma  is  the  consequence.  Action  and  reaction 
are  equal.  The  blow  dealt  at  morality  in  the  person  of 
the  injured  cannot  end  with  itself:  there  must  be  a  cor 
responding  recoil.  The  first  evil  gives  rise  to  an  equiva 
lent  second,  whether  it  is  met  by  resistance  or  not.  The 
assertion  looks  strange — will  perhaps  be  incredible  to 
many;  nevertheless  it  must  be  made.  And  all  we  can 


300  THE   DUTY   OF    THE    STATE. 

say  of  this  seeming  paradox  is,  that  it  shows  how  actions 
lapse  into  a  moral  chaos  when  once  the  equilibrium  of 
men's  relationships  is  destroyed. 

Thus  we  find  that  the  principle  of  non-resistance  is  not 
ethically  true,  but  only  that  of  non-aggression — that  hence 
a  government  is  justified  in  taking  up  a  defensive  attitude 
toward  foreign  enemies — and  that  the  abstract  criminality 
undoubtedly  attaching  to  such  a  proceeding  is  the  same 
criminality  which  pervades  the  administration  of  justice, 
is  the  same  criminality  of  which  government  is  itself  a 
consequence. 

§  9.  Of  international  arbitration  we  must  say,  as  of  a 
free  constitution,  or  a  good  system  of  jurisprudence,  that  its 
possibility  is  a  question  of  time.  The  same  causes  which 
once  rendered  all  government  impossible  have  hitherto 
forbidden  this  widest  extension  of  it.  A  federation  of 
peoples — a  universal  society,  can  exist  only  when  man's 
adaptation  to  the  social  state  has  become  tolerably  com 
plete.  We  have  already  seen  (p.  219),  that  in  the  earliest 
stage  of  civilization,  when  the  repulsive  force  is  strong, 
and  the  aggregative  force  weak,  only  small  communities 
are  possible;  a  modification  of  character  causes  these 
tribes,  and  satrapies,  and  gentes,  and  feudal  lordships,  and 
clans,  gradually  to  coalesce  into  nations ;  and  a  still  fur 
ther  modification  will  allow  of  a  still  further  union. 
That  the  time  for  this  is  now  drawing  nigh,  seems 
probable.  We  may  gather  as  much  from  the  favour 
with  which  such  an  arrangement  is  regarded.  The  recog 
nition  of  its  desirableness  foreshadows  its  realization.  In 
peace  societies,  in  proposals  for  simultaneous  disarmament, 
in  international  visits  and  addresses,  and  in  the  frequency 
with  which  friendly  interventions  now  occur,  we  may  see 
that  humanity  is  fast  growing  toward  such  a  consumma 
tion.  Though  hitherto  impracticable,  and  perhaps  im- 


A   BROTHERHOOD   OF   NATIONS.  301' 

practicable  at  the  present  moment,  a  brotherhood  of  na 
tions  is  being  made  practicable  by  the  very  efforts  used 
to  bring  it  about.  These  philanthropic  enthusiasms, 
which  the  worldly-wise  think  so  ridiculous,  are  essential 
parts  of  the  process  by  which  the  desideratum  is  being 
wrought  out.  Perhaps  no  fact  is  more  significant  of  the 
change  going  on  than  the  spread  of  that  non-resistance 
theory  lately  noticed.  That  we  should  find  sprinkled 
amongst  us  men,  who  from  the  desire  to  receive  this  ultra- 
humane  doctrine  do  violence  to  their  perceptions  of  what 
is  due  to  themselves,  cannot  but  afford  matter  for  congrat- 

'  O 

illation.  Unsound  as  the  idea  may  be,  its  origin  is  good. 
It  is  a  redundant  utterance  of  that  sympathy  which  trans 
forms  the  savage  man  into  the  social  man,  the  brutal  into 
the  benevolent,  the  unjust  into  the  just ;  and,  taken  in 
conjunction  with  other  signs  of  the  times,  prophesies 
that  a  better  relationship  between  nations  is  approach 
ing  Meanwhile,  in  looking  forward  to  some  all-em 
bracing  federal  arrangement,  we  must  keep  in  mind  that 
the  stability  of  so  complicated  a  political  organization  de 
pends,  not  upon  the  fitness  of  one  nation  but  upon  the 
fitness  of  many. 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

^  THE    LIMIT    OF    STATE-DUTY. 


1.  (A  function  to  each  organ,  and,eaqh  organ  to  its 
/>wn  function,  is  the  law  of  all  organization)  /To  do  its  work 
/well,  an  apparatus  must  possess  special  fitness  for  that 
/  work ;  and   this  will  amount  to  tmfitness  for  any  other 
workr~~7The  lungs  cannot  digest,  the  heart  cannot  respire, 
the  stomach  cannot  propel  blood.     Each  muscle  and  each 
gland  must  have  its  own  particular  nerve.     There  is  not  a 


302  THE   LIMIT   OF    STATE-DUTY. 

fibre  in  the  body  but  what  has  a  channel  to  bring  it  food, 
a  channel  to  take  its  food  away,  an  agency  for  causing  it 
'to  assimilate  nutriment,  an  agency  for  stimulating  it  to 
perform  its  peculiar  duty,  and  a  mechanism  to  take  away 
effete  matter;  not  one  of  which  can  be  dispensed  with. 
Between  creatures  of  the  lowest  type,  and  creatures  of  the 
highest,  we  similarly  find  the  essential  difference  to  be, 
that  in  the  one  the  vital  actions  are  carried  on  by  a  few 
simple  agents,  whilst  in  the  other  the  vital  actions  are 
severally  decomposed  into  their  component  parts,  and 
each  of  these  parts  has  an  agent  to  itself.  In  organiza 
tions  of  another  order  the  same  principle  is  apparent. 
When  the  manufacturer  discovered  that  by  confining  each 
of  his  employes  wholly  to  one  process,  he  could  immensely 
increase  the  productive  powers  of  his  establishment,  he 
did  but  act  upon  this  same  rule,  of  one  function  to  one 
organ.  If  we  compare  the  mercantile  arrangements  of  a 
village  with  those  of  a  city,  we  shall  find  that  the  hucksters 
of  the  one  carry  on  many  trades  each,  whilst  every  shop 
keeper  of  the  other  confines  himself  to  a  single  trade; 
showing  us  how  a  highly-developed  apparatus  for  the  dis 
tribution  of  commodities  is  similarly  distinguished  by  sub 
division  of  duties.  Language,  too,  exemplifies  the  same 
truth.  Between  its  primitive  state,  in  which  it  consisted 
of  nothing  but  nouns,  used  vaguely  to  indicate  all  ideas 
indiscriminately,  and  its  present  state,  in  which  it  consists 
of  numerous  "  parts  of  speech,"  the  process  of  growth  has 
been  that  of  gradually  separating  words  into  classes  serv 
ing  different  purposes ;  and  just  as  fast  as  this  process  has 
advanced,  has  language  become  capable  of  completely 
fulfilling  its  end. 

May  we  not,  then,  suspect  that  the  assigning  of  ono 
function  to  one  organ,  is  the  condition  of  efficiency  in  all 
instrumentalities?  If,  as  far  as  we  can  see,  such  is  the 
law  not  only  of  natural  organizations,  but  of  what,  in  a 


RESTRICTION   OF   GOVERNMENTAL   FUNCTIONS.         303 

superficial  sense,  we  call  artificial  ones,  does  it  not  seem 
probable  that  it  is  the^-universal  law  ?  Will  it  not  be  the 
law  of  institutions  ?  (Will  it  not  be  the  law  of  the  state? 
Must  we  not  expect  £hat  with  a  government  also,  special 
adaptation  to  one  end  implies  non-adaptation  to  other 
ends  ?  And  is  it  not  likely  that  by  devolving  on  a  gov 
ernment  additional  functions,  the  due  discharge  of  its 
peculiar  function  will  be  sacrificed  ?  And  would  not  this 
imply  that  a  government  ought  not  to  undertake  such 
additional  functions  ?y 

But  laying  aside  analogy,  let  us  inquire  whether  it  is 
not  the  fact,  that,  in  assuming  any  office  besides  its  origi 
nal  one,  the  state  begins  to  lose  the  power  of  fulfilling 
that  original  one.  What  is  it  that  we  call  the  state  ? 
Men  politically  associated.  How  associated  ?  Volun 
tarily.  For  what  purpose?  For  mutual  protection. 
Men  voluntarily  associated  for  mutual  protection}  this 
then  is  our  definition.  Now,  when  rightly  ordered,  the 
conditions  on  which  this  voluntary  association  offers  its 
services,  must  be  such  as  enable  it  to  afford  the  greatest 
amount  of  protection  possible.  If  otherwise — if  it  insists 
on  non-essential  conditions  which  prevent  some  men  from 
accepting  its  services,  or  on  conditions  which  unnecessarily 
compromise  the  liberty  of  those  men  who  do  accept  its 
services,  it  manifestly  fails  to  that  extent  in  performing 
its  function.  ~Now  the  moment  the  state  undertakes  a 
second  office  it  does  all  this.  Men  leagued  together  for  a 
special  object  will  never  unanimously  agree  in  the  pursuit 
of  any  other  object.  .So  long  as  our  joint-stock  protec 
tion-society  confines  itself  to  guaranteeing  the  rights  of  its 
members,  it  is  pretty  certain  to  be  coextensive  with  the 
nation ;  for  whilst  such  an  organization  is  needed  at  all, 
most  men  will  sacrifice  something  to  secure  its  guardian 
ship.  But  let  an  additional  duty  be  assigned  to  it,  and 
there  will  immediately  arise  more  or  less  schism.  The 


304  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

dissenting  minority  may  in  such  case  consist  of  two  par 
ties  ;  the  one  comprising  those  who  have  so  great  a  repug 
nance  to  the  contemplated  arrangement,  as  to  resolve 
upon  seceding  rather  than  consent  to  it ;  and  a  larger 
party  consisting  of  those  who  grumble  at  the  imposition 
of  additional  charges  for  the  doing  what  they  do  not  wish 
to  be  done,  but  who  think  well  to  submit  rather  than 
give  up  the  benefits  of  protection.  Toward  both  these 
parties  the  state  fails  in  its  duty.  The  one  it  drives  away 
by  disadvantageous  terms ;  and  from  the  other  it  exacts 
sacrifices  beyond  what  are  needful  for  the  performance  of 
its  original  function  ;  and  by  so  doing  becomes  an  aggres 
sor  instead  of  a  protector.  Observe  how  the  case  stands 
when  put  personally. 

"  Your  taxes  are  heavier  this  year  than  last,"  complains 
a  citizen  to  the  government ;  "  how  is  it  ?  " 

"  The  sums  voted  for  these  new  school-houses,  and  for 
the  salaries  of  the  masters  and  mistresses,  have  increased 
the  draught  upon  our  exchequer,"  replies  the  government. 

"  School-houses,  masters  and  mistresses — what  have  I 
to  do  with  these  ?  you  are  not  charging  me  with  the  cost 
of  them,  are  you  ?  " 

"Yes." 

"  Why,  I  never  authorized  you  to  do  so." 

"True;  but  parliament,  or  in  other  words,  the  major 
ity  of  the  nation,  has  decided  that  the  education  of  the 
young  shall  be  entrusted  to  us,  and  has  authorized  us 
to  raise  such  funds  as  may  be  necessary  for  fulfilling  this 
trust." 

"  But  suppose  I  wish  to  superintend  the  education  of 
my  children  myself?  " 

"  You  may  do  as  you  please ;  but  you  must  pay  for 
the  privilege  we  offer,  whether  you  avail  yourself  of 
it  or  not.  Even  if  you  have  no  children  you  must  still 
pay." 


„  THE   CASE   PUT   PERSONALLY.  305 

"  And  what  if  I  refuse  ?  " 

"  Why,  were  we  to  act  up  to  old  precedents,  we 
should  punish  you ;  but  as  things  now  stand  we  shall  con 
tent  ourselves  with  giving  notice  that  you  have  outlawed 
yourself." 

"  Nay,  I  have  no  wish  to  do  that ;  I  cannot  at  present 
dispense  with  your  protection." 

"  Very  well,  then  you  must  agree  to  our  terms,  and 
pay  your  share  of  the  new  tax." 

"  See,  now,  what  a  dilemma  you  place  me  in.  As  I 
dare  not  relinquish  the  protection  I  entered  into  political 
combination  to  obtain,  I  must  either  give  you  a  part  of  my 
property  for  nothing ;  or,  should  I  make  a  point  of  having 
some  equivalent,  I  must  cease  to  do  that  which  my 
natural  affections  prompt.  "Will  you  answer  me  a  few 
questions  ?  " 

"  Certainly." 

"  What  is  it  that  you,  as  a  national  executive,  have 
been  appointed  for  ?  Is  it  not  to  maintain  the  rights  of 
those  who  employ  you ;  or,  in  other  words,  to  guarantee 
to  each  the  fullest  freedom  for  the  exercise  of  his  faculties 
compatible  with  the  equal  freedom  of  all  others  ?  " 

"  It  has  been  so  decided." 

"And  it  has  been  also  decided  that  you  are  justi 
fied  in  diminishing  this  freedom  only  to  such  extent  as 
may  be  needful  for  preserving  the  remainder,  has  it  not  ?  " 

"  That  is  evidently  a  corollory." 

"  Exactly.  And  now  let  me  ask  what  is  this  property, 
this  money,  of  which  in  the  shape  of  taxes  you  are 
demanding  from  me  an  additional  amount  ?  Is  it  not 
that  which  enables  me  to  get  food,  clothing,  shelter, 
recreation,  or,  to  repeat  the  original  expression — that 
on  which  I  depend  for  the  exercise  of  most  of  my 
faculties  ?  " 

"It  is." 


306  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

"  Therefore  to  decrease  my  property  is  to  decrease  my 
freedom  to  exercise  my  faculties,  is  it  not  ?  " 

"  Clearly." 

"  Then  this  new  impost  of  yours  will  practically  de 
crease  my  freedom  to  exercise  my  faculties  ?  " 

"Yes." 

"  Well,  do  you  not  now  perceive  the  contradiction  ? 
Instead  of  acting  the  part  of  a  protector  you  are  acting 
the  part  of  an  aggressor.  What  you  were  appointed  to 
guarantee  me  and  others,  you  are  now  taking  away.  To 
see  that  the  liberty  of  each  man  to  pursue  the  objects  of 
his  desires  is  unrestricted,  save  by  the  like  liberty  of  all,  is 
your  special  function.  To  diminish  this  liberty  by  means 
of  taxes,  or  civil  restraints  more  than  is  absolutely  need 
ful  for  performing  such  function,  is  wrong,  because  adverse 
to  the  function  itself.  Now  your  new  impost  does  so 
diminish  this  liberty  more  than  is  absolutely  needful,  and 
it  is  consequently  unjustifiable." 

Thus  we  find,  as  was  foretold,  thav  whenever  the  state 
begins  to  exceed  its  office  of  protector,  it  begins  to  lose 
protective  power.  Not  a  single  supplementary  service 
can  it  attempt  without  producing  dissent ;  and  in  propor 
tion  -to  the  amount  of  dissent  so  produced  by  it,  the  state 
defeats  the  end  for  which  it  was  established;} -Let  it  un 
dertake  many  additional  duties,  and  there  win  be  scarcely 
a  man  who  does  not  object  to  being  taxed  on  account  of 
one  or  more  of  them — scarcely  a  man,  therefore,  to  whom 
the  state  does  not  in  some  degreexio  the  very  opposite  of 
what  it  is  appointed  to  do.  ^Now  this  thing  which 
the  state  is  appointed  to  do  is  the  essential  thing — the 
thing  by  which  society  is  made  possible ;  and  these  other 
things  proposed  to  be  done  are  non-essential,  for  society  is 
possible  without  them.  And  as  the  essential  ought  not  to 
be  sacrificed  to  the  non-essential,  the  state  ought  not  to 
do  any  thing  but  protect. 


FRICTION   OF   GOVERNMENTAL   MACHINERY.  307 

§  2.  It  will  perhaps  be  urged,  however,  that  the 
evil  done  by  a  government,  when  it  thus  oversteps  its 
original  dutjr,  is  only  an  apparent  one ;  seeing  that  though 
it  diminishes  men's  spheres  of  action  in  one  direction,  it 
adds  to  them  in  another.  All  such  supplementary  func 
tions,  an  objector  may  say,  subserve  in  some  way  or  other 
the  wants  of  society  ;  that  is,  they  facilitate  the  satisfac 
tion  of  men's  desires ;  that  is,  they  afford  to  men  greater 
freedom  for  the  exercise  of  their  faculties.  For  if ,  you 
argue  that  taking  away  a  man's  property  diminishes  his 
freedom  to  exercise  his  faculties,  because  it  diminishes  his 
means  of  exercising  them,  then  you  must  in  fairness 
admit,  that  by  procuring  for  him  certain  of  the  objects  he 
desires,  or  by  taking  away  the  obstacles  that  lie  between 
him  and  those  objects,  or  by  otherwise  helping  him  to 
his  ends,  the  state  is  increasing  his  power  to  exercise 
his  faculties,  and  hence  is  practically  increasing  his  free 
dom. 

To  all  which  the  answer  is,  ithat  cutting  away  men's 
opportunities  on  one  side,  to  addHo  them  on  another,  is  at 
best  accompanied  by  a  loss*^  Let  us  remember  that  the 
force  by  which  a  society,  through  its  government,  works 
out  certain  results,  is  never  increased  by  administrative 
mechanism,  but  that  part  of  it  escapes  in  friction  Gov 
ernment  evidently  cannot  create  any  facilities  for  the  ex 
ercise  of  faculties ;  all  it  can  do  is  to  redistribute  them. 
It  is  easy  to  calculate  what  one  of  these  artificial  arrange 
ments  can  effect.  (  Set  down  the  amount  of  power  to  sat 
isfy  his  wants,  which  it  takes  from  a  citizen  in  extra  taxes ; 
deduct  the  serious  waste  occurring  under  official  manipu 
lations  ;  and  the  remainder,  transformed  into  some  new 
shape,  is  all  that  can  be  returned  to  him.  The  transaction 
is  consequently  a  losing  one./  So  that,  whilst  in  attempt 
ing  to  serve  the  public  by  undertaking  supplementary 
functions,  a  government  fails  in  its  duty  toward  all  who 


308  THE   LIMIT   OF    STATE-DUTY. 

dissent  ;  it  does  not  really  compensate  for  this  by  addi 
tional  advantages  afforded  to  the  rest  ;  to  whom  it  merely 
gives,  with  one  hand,  less  than  it  takes  away  with  the 
other. 


§  3.  But  in  truth  the  transaction  is  a  yet  more 
detrimental  one  than  it  thus  appears,  for  even  the  gift  is  a 
delusion  —  has  a  minus  sign  before  it,  unobserved,  perhaps, 
by  the  many,  but  sufficiently  visible  to  the  analyst.  The 
expediency-philosophy  of  which  this  general  state-superin 
tendence  is  a  practical  expression,  embodies  the  belief  that 
government  ought  not  only  to  guarantee  men  in  the  un 
molested  pursuit  of  happiness,  but  shoiild  provide  the 
happiness  for  them  and  deliver  it  at  their  doors.  Now 
no  scheme  could  be  more  self-defeating,  for  no  scheme 
could  be  more  completely  at  variance  with  the  constitu- 
tion  of  things.  Man,  as  briefly  delineated  at  the  outset, 
(p.  31)  consists  of  a  congeries  of  faculties,  qualifying  him 
for  surrounding  conditions.  Each  of  these  faculties,  if 
normally  developed,  yields  to  him,  when  exercised,  a 
gratification  constituting  part  of  his  happiness  ;  whilst,  in 
the  act  of  exercising  it,  some  deed  is  done  subserving  the 
wants  of  the  man  as  a  whole,  and  affording  to  the  other 
faculties  the  opportunity  o£  performing  in  turn  their  re 
spective  functions,  and  of  producing  every  one  its  peculiar 
pleasure  :  so  that,  when  healthily  balanced,  each  subserves 
all,  and  all  subserve  each.  We  cannot  live  at  all  unless 
this  mechanism  works  with  tolerable  efficiency  ;  and  we 
can  live  entirely  —  that  is,  can  have  entire  happiness  —  only 
when  the  reciprocity  between  capacities  and  requirements 
is  perfect.  yAfl  before  said,  the  complete  man  is  the  self- 
sufficing  man  —  the  man  who  is  in  every  point  fitted  to  his 
circumstances  —  the  man  in  whom  there  are  desires  corre 
sponding  not  only  to  all  the  acts  which  are  immediately 
advantageous,  but  to  those  which  are  remotely  so.  I  Evi- 


BAD   INFLUENCE   OF    STATE   ASSISTANCE.  309 

dently,  one  who  is  thus  rightly  constituted  cannot  be 
helped.  To  do  any  thing  for  him  by  some  artificial 
agency,  i^jfco  supersede  certain  of  his  powers — is  to  leave 
them  unexercised,  and  therefore  to  diminish  his  happiness.] 
,/To  healthily-developed  citizens,  therefore,  state  aid  is 
doubly  detrimental.  It  injures  them  both  by  what  it 
takes  and  by  what  it  does.  By  the  revenues  required  to 
support  its  agencies  it  absorbs  the  means  on  which  cer 
tain  of  the  faculties  depend  for  their  exercise;  and  by 
the  agencies  themselves  it  shuts  out  other  faculties  from 
their  spheres  of  action. 

"  But  men  are  not  complete ;  they  are  not  healthily 
developed ;  they  have  not  capacities  in  harmony  with  their 
wants ;  and  therefore,  as  matters  stand,  a  "government 
does  not  by  its  interpositions  preoccupy  offices  which  there 
are  faculties  to  fill."  Very  true ;  but  next  to  being  what 
we  ought  to  be,  the  most  desirable  thing  is  that  we  should 
become  what  we  ought  to  be  as  fast  as  possible.  (We  are 
undergoing  the  process  of  adaptation.  We  have  to  lose 
the  characteristics  which  fitted  us  for  our  original  statq, 
and  to  gain  those  which  will  fit  us  for  our  present  statej 
and  the  question  to  be  asked,  respecting  these  mechanical 
remedies  for  our  deficiencies,  is — do  they,  facilitate  the 
change  ?  Certainly  not.  A  moment's  thought  will  con 
vince  us  that  they  retard  it.  ISTo  one  can  need  reminding 
that  demand  and  supply  is  the  law  of  life  as  well  as  the 
law  of  trade — that  strength  will  show  itself  only  where 
strength  is  called  for — that  an  undeveloped  capability  can 
be  developed  only  under  the  stern  discipline  of  necessity. 
Would  you  draw  out  and  increase  some  too  feeble  senti 
ment  ?  Then  you  must  set  it  to  do,  as  well  as  it  can,  the 
work  required  of  it.  It  must  be  kept  ever  active,  ever 
strained,  ever  inconvenienced  by  its  incompetency.  Tin 
der  this  treatment  it  will,  in  the  slow  lapse  of  generations, 
attain  to  efficiency;  and  what  was  once  its  impossible 


310  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

task  will  become  the  source  of  a  healthy,  pleasurable,  and 
desired  excitement.  /But  let  a  state-instrumentality  be 
thrust  between  such  faculty  and  its  work,  and  the  process 
of  adaptation  is  at  once  suspended.  Growth  ceases ;  and 
in  its  place  commences  retrogressionT)  The  embryo  agency 
now  superseded  by  some  commission — some  board  and 
staif  of  officers,  straightway  dwindles ;  for  power  is  as  in 
evitably  lost  by  inactivity  as  it  is  gained  by  activity. 
\Hence,  humanity  no  longer  goes  on  moulding  itself  into 
harmony  with  the  natural  requirements  of  the  social  state ; 
but  begins,  instead,  to  assume  a  form  fitting  these  artificial 
requirements.  It  is  consequently  stopped  in  its  progress 
toward  that  self-sufficingness  characteristic  of  the  com 
plete  man ;  or,  in  other  words,  is  prevented  from  fulfilling 
the  conditions  essential  to  complete  happiness.  ^  And  thus, 
as  before  said,  not  only  does  a  government"' reverse  its 
function  by  taking  aAvay  more  property  than  is  needful  for 
protective  purposes,  but  even  what  it  gives,  in  return  for 
the  excess  so  taken,  is  in  essence  a  loss. 

§  4.  There  is  indeed  one  faculty,  or  rather  combina 
tion  of  faculties,  for  whose  shortcomings  the  state,  as  far 
as  in  it  lies,  may  advantageously  compensate — that,  name 
ly,  by  which  society  is  made  possible.,  It  is  clear  that  any 
being  whose  constitution  is  to  be  moulded  into  fitness  for 
new  conditions  of  existence  must  be  placed  under  those 
conditions.  Or,  putting  the  proposition  specifically — it  is 
clear  that  man  can  become  adapted  to  the  social  state, 
only  by  being  retained  in  the  social  state.  This  granted, 
it  follows  that  as  man  has  been,  and  is  still,  deficient  in 
those  feelings  which,  by  dictating  just  conduct,  prevent 
the  perpetual  antagonism  of  individuals  and  their  conse 
quent  disunion,  some  artificial  agency  is  required  by  which 
their  union  may  be  maintained.  Only  by  the  process  of 
adaptation  itself  can  be  produced  that  character  which 


>p 

THE   FIKST   FUNCTION    OF   GOVERNMENft-r  *~  -311 

U  N  Fv  E 


makes  social  equilibrium  spontaneous.  And 
this  process  is  going  on,  an^nstrumentality  must  be  em 
ployed,  firstly  to  bind  men  into  an  associated  state,  and 
secondly  to  check  all  conduct  endangering  the  existence 
of  that  state.  Such  an  instrumentality  we  have  in  a  gov 
ernment^' 

And  now  mark  that  whether  we  consider  government 
from  this  point  of  view,  or  from  that  previously  occupied, 
our  conclusions  respecting  it  are  in  essence  identical.  For 
when  government  fulfils  the  function  here  assigned  it,  of 
retaining  men  in  the  circumstances  to  which  they  are  to 
be  adapted,  it  fulfils  the  function  which  we  on  other 
grounds  assigned  it — that  of  protector.  /  To  administer 
justice — to  mount  guard  over  men's  rights — to  prevent 
aggression — is  simply  to  render  society  possible,  to  enable 
men  to  live  together — to  keep  them  in  contact  with  their 
new  conditions.  And  seeing  that  the  two  definitions  are 
thus  at  root  the  same,  we  shall  be  prepared  for  the  fact  that, 
in  whichever  way  we  specify  its  duty,  the  state  cannot  ex 
ceed  that  duty  without  defeating  itself.  For,  if  regarded 
as  a  protector,  we  find  that  the  moment  it  does  any  thing 
more  than  protect,  it  becomes  an  aggressor  instead  of  a 
protector ;  and  if  regarded  as  a  help  to  adaptation,  we 
find  that  when  it  does  any  thing  more  than  sustain  the 
social  state,  it  retards  adaptation  instead  of  hastening  it. 

§  5.  Thus  much  for  the  positive  evidence:  let  us 
now  enter  upon  the  negative.  The  expediency-philoso 
phers  say  that  government  1ms  other  functions  to  fulfil 
besides  that  of  upholding  men's  rights.  If  so,  what  are 
they  ?  To  the  assertion  that  the  boundary  line  of  state- 
duty  as  above  drawn  is  at  the  wrong  place,  the  obvious 
rejoinder  is — show  us  where  it  should  be  drawn.  This 
appeal  the  expediency-philosophers  have  never  yet  been 
able  to  answer.  Their  alleged  definitions  are  no  defini- 


812  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

tions  at  all.  As  was  proved  at  the  outset  (p.  13),  to  say 
that  government  ought  to  do  that  which  is  "  expedient," 
or  to  do  that  which  will  tend  to  produce  the  **  greatest 
happiness,"  5fr  to  do  that  which  will  subserve  the  ^gen 
eral  good,"  Is  to  say  just  nothing ;  for  there  is  infinite  dis 
agreement  respecting  the  natures  of  these  desiderata.  A 
definition  of  which  the  terms  are  indefinite  is  an  absurdi 
ty.  Whilst  the  practical  interpretation  of  "  expediency  " 
remains  a  matter  of  opinion,  to  say  that  a  government 
should  do  that  which  is  "  expedient,"  is  to  say  that  it 
should  do,  what  we  think  it  should  do ! 

Still  then  our  demand  is — a  definition.  Between  the 
two  extremes  of  its  possible  power — the  every  thing  and 
the  nothing  with  which  a  government  may  be  entrusted, 
where  is  the  proper  limitation  ?:-  Of  the  innumerable  fields 
of  action  lying  open  to  an  uncontrolled  legislature,  which 
shall  it  occupy  ?  Shall  it  extend  its  interference  to  the 
fixing  of  creeds,  as  in  the  old  times ;  or  to  overlooking 
modes  of  manufacture,  farming  operations,  and  domestic 
affairs,  as  it  once  did ;  or  to  commerce,  as  of  late — to  edu 
cation,  as  now — to  public  health,  as  some  wish — to  dress,  as 
in  China — to  literature,  as  in  Austria — to  charity,  to  man 
ners,  to  amusements  ?  If  not  to  all  of  them,  to  which  of 
them  ?  Should  the  perplexed  inquirer  seek  refuge  in  au 
thority,  he  will  find  precedents  not  only  for  these  but  for 
many  more  such  interferences.  If,  like  those  who  disap 
prove  of  master  tailors  having  their  work  done  off  the 
premises,  or  like  those  who  want  to  prevent  the  produce 
of  industrial  prisons  dispfcxcing  that  of  free  artisans,  or 
like  those  who  would  restrain  charity-school  children  from 
competing  wijh  seamstresses,  he  thinks  it  desirable  to 
meddle  with  trad#  arrangements,  there  are  plenty  of  ex 
emplars  for  him.\  There  is  the  law  of  Henry  VII.,  which 
directed  people  at  what  fairs  they  should  sell  their  goods; 
and  that  of  Edward  VI.,  which  enacted  a  fine  of  £100  for 


ITS   MULTITUDINOUS   ASSUMPTIONS.  313 

a  usurious  bargain;  and  that  of  James  I.,  which  prescribed 
the  quantity  of  ale  to  be  sold  for  a  penny  /  and  that  of 
Henry  VIII.,  which  made  it  penal  to  sell  any  pins  but 
such  as  are  "  double  headed,  and  have  their  head  soldered 
fast  to  the  shank,  and  well  smoothed ;  the  shank  well 
shaven ;  the  point  well  and  round-filed  and  sharpened." 
'He  has  the  countenance,  too,  of  those  enactments  which 
fixed  the  wages  of  labour ;  and  of  those  which  dictated 
to  farmers,  as  in  1533,^vvhen  the  sowing  of  hemp  and  flax 
was  made  compulsory /and  of  those  which  forbad  the  use 
of  certain  materials,  as  that  now  largely-consumed  article, 
logwood,  was  forbidden  in  1597.  If  he  approves  of  so 
extended  a  superintendence,  perhaps  he  would  adopt  M. 
Louis  Blanc's  idea  that  "  government  should  be  consid 
ered  as  the  supreme  regulator  of  production,"  and  having 
so  adopted  it,  push  state  control  as  far  as  it  was  once  car 
ried  in  France,  when  manufacturers  were  pilloried  for  de 
fects  in  the  materials  they  employed,  and  in  the  texture 
of  their  fabrics ;  when  some  were  fined  for  weaving  of 
worsted  a  kind  of  cloth  which  the  law  said  should  be 
made  of  mohair,  and  others  because  their  camlets  were  not 
of  the  specified  width ;  and  when  a  man  was  not  at  lib 
erty  to  choose  the  place  for  his  establishment,  nor  to  work 
at  all  seasons,  nor  to  work  for  everybody.  Is  this  con 
sidered  too  detailed  an  interference  ?  Then,  perhaps, 
greater  favour  will  be  shown  to  those  German  regulations 
by  which  a  shoemaker  is  prevented  from  following  his 
craft  until  an  inspecting  jury  has  certified  to  his  compe 
tence  ;  which  disable  a  man  who  has  chosen  one  calling 
from  ever  adopting  another ;  and  which  forbid  any  foreign 
tradesman  from  settling  in  a  German  town  without  a  li 
cense.  And  if  work  is  to  be  regulated,  is  it  not  proper 
that  work  should  be  provided,  and  the  idle  Compelled  to 
perform  a  due  amount  of  it  ?  In  which  case  how  shall  we 
deal  with  our  vagrant  population  ?  Shall  we  take  a  hint 
14 


314:  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

from  Fletcher  of  Saltoun,  who  warmly  advocated  the  es 
tablishment  of  slavery  in  Scotland  as  a  boon  to  "  so  many 
thousands  of  our  people  who  are  at  this  day  dying  for 
want  of  bread  "  ?  or  shall  we  adopt  the  analogous  sugges 
tion  of  Mr.  Caiiyle,  who  would  remedy  the  distresses  of 
Ireland  by  organizing  its  people  into  drilled  regiments  of 
diggers  ?  The  hours  of  labour  too — what  must  be  done 
about  these  ?  Having  acceded  to  the  petition  of  the  fac 
tory  workers,  ought  we  not  to  entertain  that  of  the  jour 
neymen  bakers  ?  and  if  that  of  the  journeymen  bakers, 
why  not,  as  Mr.  Cobden  asks,  consider  the  cases  of  the 
glass-blowers,  the  nightmen,  the  iron-founders,  the  Shef 
field  knife-grinders,  and  indeed  all  other  classes,  including 
the  hard-worked  M.P.s  themselves.  And.^hen  employ 
ment  has  been  provided,  and  the  hours  of  labour  fixed, 
and  trade  regulations  settled,  we  must  decide  how  far  the 
state  ought  to  look  after  peoples'  minds,  and  morals,  and 
health.  '  There  is  this  education  question :  having  satisfied 
the  prevalent  wish  for  government  schools  with  tax-paid 
teachers,  and  adopted  Mr.  Ewart's  plan  for  town-libraries 
and  museums,  should  we  not  canvass  tjae  supplementary 
proposal  to  have  national  lecturers  ?  and  if  this  proposal 
i,s  assented  to,  would  it  not  be  well  to  carry  out  the  scheme 
of  Sir  David  Brewster,  who  desires  to  have  "'men  ordained 
by  the  State  to  the  undivided  functions  of  science  " — "  an 
intellectual  priesthood,"  "  to  develop,  the  glorious  truths 
which  time  and  space  embosom "  ?  *  Then  having  estab 
lished  "  an  intellectual  priesthood  "  to  keep  company  with 
our  religious  one,  a  priesthood  of  physic  such  as  is  advo 
cated  by  certain  feeless  medical  men,  and  of  which  we 
have  already  the  germ  in  our  union  doctors,  would  nicely 
complete  the  trio/  And  when  it  had  been  agreed  to  put 
the  sick  under  the  care  of  public  officials,  consistency 
would  of  course  demand  the  adoption  of  Mr.  G.  A.  Walk- 

*  See  Address  to  the  British  Association  at  Edinburgh,  in  1850. 


OLD  NOTIONS  UPON  THE  SUBJECT.        315 

er's  system  of  government  funerals,  under  which  "  those 
in  authority  "  are  "  to  take  especial  care  "  that  "  the  poor 
est  of  our  brethren  "  shall  have  "  an  appropriate  and  sol 
emn  transmission  "  to  the  grave,  and  are  to  grant  in  cer 
tain  cases  "  gratuitous  means  of  interment."  Having  car 
ried  out  thus  far  the  communist  plan  of  doing  every  thing 
for  everybody,  should  we  not  consider  the  people's 
amusements,  and,  taking  example  from  the  opera-subsidy 
in  France,  establish  public  ball-rooms,  and  gratis  concerts, 
and  cheap  theatres,  with  state-paid  actors,  musicians  and 
masters  of  the  ceremonies ;  using  care  at  the  same  time 
duly  to  regulate  the  popular  taste,  as  indeed  in  the  case 
of  the  Art-Union  subscribers  our  present  Government  pro-, 
posed  to  do  ?  Speaking  of  taste  naturally  reminds  us  of 
dress,  in  which  sundry  improvements  might  be  enforced ; 
for  instance — the  abolition  of  hats :  we  should  have  good 
precedent  either  in  Edward  IV.,  who  fined  those  wearing 
"  any  gown  or  mantell "  not  according  to  specification, 
and  who  limited  the  superfluity  of  peoples'  boot  toes,  or 
in  Charles  II.,  who  prescribed  the  material  for  his  subjects' 
grave-clothes.  The  matter  of  health,  too,  would  need  at 
tending  to ;  and,  in  dealing  with  this,  might  we  not  prof 
itably  reconsider  those  ancient  statutes  which  protected 
peoples'  stomachs  by  restricting  the  expenses  of  their  ta 
bles  :  or,  remembering  how  injurious  are  our  fashionable 
late  hours,  might  we  not  advantageously  take  a  hint  from 
the  old  Norman  practice,  and  fix  the  time  at  which  people 
should  put  out  their  fires  and  go  to  bed :  or  might  we  not 
with  benefit  act  upon  the  opinion  of  M.  Beausobre,  a 
statesman,  who  said  it  was  "  proper  to  watch  during  the 
fruit  seasdn,  lest  the  people  eat  that  which  is  not  ripe "  ? 
And,  then,  by  way  of  making  the  superintendence  quite 
complete,  would  it  not  be  well  to  follow  the  example  of 
that  Danish  king  who  gaye  directions  to  his  subjects  how 
they  should  scour  their  floors,  and  polish  their  furniture  ? 


316  THE  LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

r 

\J\lultiply  these  questions  into  a  volume  full ;  add  to 
them  the  endless  subordinate  ones  to  which  in  practice 
they  must  give  rise ;  and  some  idea  may  be  formed  of  the 
maze  through  which  the  expediency-philosopher  has  to 
find  his  way.  Where  now  is  his  clue  ?  Again  comes  the 
inquiry — how  does  he  propose  to  determine  between  what 
should  be  attempted  and  what  should  not  ?  which  is  his 
definition  ?y  If  he  would  escape  the  charge  of  political 
empiricism,  he  must  show  us  some  scientific  test  by  which 
he  can  in  each  case  determine  whether  or  not  state-super 
intendence  is  desirable.  Between  the  one  extreme  of  en 
tire  non-interference,  and  the  other  extreme  in  which  every 
citizen  is  to  be  transformed  into  a  grown-up  baby,  "  with 
bib  and  pap-spoon,"  there  lie  innumerable  stopping  places  ; 
and  he  who  would  have  the  state  do  more  than  protect  is 
required  to  say  where  he  means  to  draw  the  line,  and  to 
give  us  substantial  reasons  why  it  must  be  just  there  and 
nowhere  else. 

§  6.  'After  the  difficulty  of  finding  out  the  thing  to 
be  done,  tkejre  comes  the  other  difficulty  of  finding  out  the 
way  to  do  it.)  Let  us  excuse  the  expediency-philosopher 
one-half  of  iiis  task — let  us  for  the  occasion  assume  some 
thing  to  be  unanimously  agreed  to  as  a  proper  undertak 
ing;  and  now  suppose  we  inquire  of  him — How  about 
your  means  of  accomplishing  it  ?  Are  you  quite  sure  they 
will  answer?  Are  you  quite  sure  that  your  apparatus 
will  not  break  down  under  its  work  ?  quite  sure  that  it 
will  produce  the  result  you  wish  ?  quite  sure  that  it  will 
not  produce  some  very  different  result  ?  quite  sure  that 
you  will  not  get  into  one  of  those  imbroglios  that  so  many 
have  lost  themselves  in  ?  There  is  no  lack  of  warnings. 
"  Let  us  put  down  usury,"  said  to  themselves  the  rulers  of 
the  middle  ages :  they  tried ;  and  did  just  the  reverse  of 
what  they  intended ;  for  it  has  turned  out,  that  "  all  regu- 


MISCARRIAGE   OF  LEGISLATIVE   SCHEMES.  317 

lations  interfering  with  the  interest  of  money  render  its 
terms  more  rigorous  and  burdensome."  "  We  will  extermi 
nate  Protestantism,"  whispered  the  continental  Catholics 
to  each  other :  they  tried ;  and  instead  of  doing  this  they 
planted  in  England  the  germs  of  a  manufacturing  organi 
zation  which  has  to  a  great  extent  superseded  their  own. 
"  It  will  be  well  to  give  the  labouring  classes  fixed  settle 
ments,"  thought  the  Poor  Law  legislators ;  and  having 
acted  out  this  thought  there  eventually  grew  up  the  clear 
ance  system,  with  its  overcrowded  cottages,  and  nonresi 
dent  labour-gangs.  "  We  must  suppress  these  brothels," 
decided  the  authorities  of  Berlin  in  1845  :  they  did  sup 
press  them;  and  in  1848,  the  registrar's  books  and  the 
hospital  returns  proved  matters  to  be  considerably  worse 
than  before.*  "  Suppose  we  compel  the  London  parishes 
to  maintain  and  educate  their  pauper  children  in  the  coun 
try,"  said  statesmen  in  the  time  of  George  III. ;  "  '  it 
would  greatly  tend  to  the  preservation  of  the  lives  of  the 
infant  parish  poor : ' "  so  they  passed  the  Y  Geo.  III.,  c. 
39;  and  by-and-by  there  began  the  business  of  child-farm 
ing,  ending  in  the  Tooting  tragedy.  Are  not  such  warn 
ings  worthy  of  attention  ?  Or  does  the  expediency-phi 
losopher  value  those  facts  only  which  are  embodied  in 
Blue-books  and  Board  of  Trade  tables  ? 

/  Then  as  to  his  administrative  mechanisms — can  he  an 
swer  for  the  satisfactory  working  of  them  ? )  The  common 
remark  that  public  business  is  worse  managed  than  all 
other  business,  is  not  altogether  unfounded.  To-day  he 
will  find  it  illustrated  in  the  doings  of  a  department  which 
makes  a  valuable  estate  like  the  New  Forest,  a  loss  to  the 
country  of  £3,000  a  year ;  which  allowed  Salcey  Forest 
to  be  wholly  cut  down  and  made  away  with  by  a  dishon 
est  agent;  and  which,  in  1848,  had  its  accounts  made  up 
to  March,  1839,  only.  To-morrow  he  may  read  of  Admi- 

*  Kcports  of  Dr.  Fr.  J.  Behrend.     See  Medical  Times,  March  16,  1850. 


318  THE  LIMIT  OF  STATE-DUTY. 

ralty  bunglings — of  ships  badly  built,  pulled  to-picces,  re 
built  and  patched — of  nearly  a  million  spent  on  iron  war- 
steamers  which  are  now  found  not  to  stand  cannon  shot — 
and  of  a  sluggishness  which  puts  the  national  dockyards 
"  about  seven  years  "  behind  all  others.  Now  the  expo 
sure  is  of  an  extravagance  which  builds  gaols  at  a  cost 
of  £1,200  per  prisoner;  and  now  of  a  carelessness  which 
permits  important  legal  records  to  rot  amongst  rubbish. 
Here  is  a  sailor  of  whom  the  State  demanded  sixpence  a 
month  towards  a  hospital  which  was  never  provided,  and 
whose  pension  from  the  Merchant-Seaman's  Fund  is  noth 
ing  like  what  it  would  have  been  from  an  ordinary  assur 
ance  society;  and  there,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  Mint 
moneyer  who  gets  more  than  £4,000  a  year  for  doing  what 
a  tithe  of  the  amount  would  amply  pay  for.  Official  de 
lay  is  seen  in  the  snail-paced  progress  of  the  Museum  Cat 
alogue  ;  official  mismanagement  in  the  building  of  Houses 
of  Parliament  not  fit  for  speaking  in  ;  and  official  perver 
sity  in  the  opposition  uniformly  made  to  improvement  by 
the  Excise,  the  Customs,  and  the  Post  Office  authorities. 
Does  the  expediency-philosopher  feel  no  apprehensions  on 
contemplating  such  evidence  ?  Or,  as  one  specially  pro 
fessing  to  be  guided  by  experience,  does  he  think  that  on 
the  whole  experience  is  in  his  favour  ? 

Perhaps  he  has  not  heard  that  of  ten  mechanical  in 
ventions  usually  some  nine  fail ;  and  that,  before  the  tenth 
can  be  made  to  answer,  endless  obstacles  that  had  never 
been  dreamed  of  have  to  be  surmounted.  Or,  if  he  has 
heard  this,  does  he  think  that  the  properties  of  humanity 
being  so  much  easier  to  understand  than  those  of  iron  and 
brass,  and  an  institution  constructed  of  living  men  being 
a  simple  thing  as  compared  with  an  inanimate  mechanism, 
legislative  schemes  are  not  likely  thus  to  miscarry  ? 

§    7.     "  It  is  a  gross  delusion  to  believe  in  the  sovereign 


GUIZOT   ON   POLITICAL   MACHINERY.  319 

power  of  political  machinery,"  says  M.  Guizot.  True : 
and  it  is  not  only  a  gross  delusion,  but  a  very  dangerous 
one.  Give  a  child  exaggerated  notions  of  its  parent's 
power,  and  it  will  by-and-by  cry  for  the  moon.  Let  a 
people  believe  in  government-omnipotence,  and  they  will 
be  pretty  certain  to  get  up  revolutions  to  achieve  impossi 
bilities.  Between  their  exorbitant  ideas  of  what  the  state 
ought  to  do  for  them  on  the  one  side,  and  its  miserable 
performances  on  the  other,  there  will  surely  be  generated 
feelings  extremely  inimical  to  social  order — feelings  which, 
by  adding  to  the  dissatisfaction  otherwise  produced,  may 
occasion  outbreaks  that  would  not  else  have  occurred. 

But  this  belief  in  "  the  sovereign  power  of  political 
machinery"  is  not  born  with  men;  they  are  taught  it. 
And  how  are  they  taught  it  ?  Evidently  by  these  preach 
ers  of  universal  legislative  superintendence — by  the  pre 
tensions  of  statesmen  themselves — and  by  having  seen, 
from  their  childhood,  all  kinds  of  functions  undertaken  by 
government  officials.  The  idea  which,  in  his  critique  upon 
the  late  events  in  France,  M.  Guizot  calls  a  "  gross  delu 
sion,"  is  an  idea  which  he,  in  common  with  others,  has 
been  practically  inculcating.  Following  in  the  steps  of 
his  predecessors,  he  has  kept  in  action,  and  in  some  cases 
even  extended,  that  system  of  official  supervision  to  which 
this  idea  owes  its  birth.  Was  it  not  natural  that  men, 
living  under  the  regulation  of  legions  of  prefects,  sub- 
prefects,  inspectors,  controllers,  intendants,  commissaries,  v 
and  other  civil  employes  to  the  number  of  535,000 — men 
who  were  educated  by  the  government,  and  taught  relig 
ion  by  it — who  had  to  ask  its  consent  before  they  could 
stir  from  home — who  could  not  publish  a  handbill  without 
a  permit  from  the  authorities,  nor  circulate  a  newspaper 
after  the  censor's  veto — who  daily  saw  it  dictating  regu 
lations  for  railways,  inspecting  and  managing  mines,  build 
ing  bridges,  making  roads,  and  erecting  monuments — who 


320  THE   LIMIT  OF   STATE-DUTY. 

were  led  to  regard  it  as  the  patron  of  science,  literature, 
and  the  fine  arts,  and  as  the  dispenser  of  honours  and  re 
wards — who  found  it  undertaking  the  manufacture  of 
gunpowder,  superintending  the  breeding  of  horses  and 
sheep,  playing  the  part  of  public  pawnbroker,  and  monopo 
lizing,  the  sale  of  tobacco  and  snuff — who  saw  it  attending 
to  every  thing,  from  the  execution  of  public  works  down 
to  the  sanitary  inspection  of  prostitutes — was  it  not  nat 
ural  that  men  so  circumstanced  should  acquire  exalted 
ideas  of  state  power?  And,  having  acquired  such  ideas, 
were  they  not  likely  to  desire  the  state  to  compass  for 
them  unattainable  benefits ;  to  get  angry  because  it  did 
not  do  this ;  and  to  attempt  by  violent  means  the  enforce 
ment  of  their  wishes  ?  Evidently  the  reply  must  be  affirm 
ative.  And  if  so,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  this 
overstepping  of  the  proper  sphere  of  government,  leading 
as  it  does  to  that  "  gross  delusion,"  a  belief  in  "  the  sov 
ereign  power  of  political  machinery,"  is  the  natural  fore 
runner  of  such  schemes  as  those  of  Blanc  and  Cabet,  and 
of  that  confusion  which  the  attempt  to  realize  them  by 
state-agency  must  produce. 

There  are  other  modes,  too,  in  which  social  stability  is 
endangered  by  this  interference  system.  It  is  a  very  ex 
pensive  system :  Jhe  further  it  is  carried,  the  larger  be 
come  the  revenues  required  :  and  we  all  know  that  heavy 
taxation  is  inseparable  from  discontent.  (^Moreover  it  is  in 
its  nature  essentially  despotic.)  In  governing  every  thing 
it  unavoidably  cramps  men ;  and,  by  diminishing  their 
liberty  of  action,  angers  them.  It  galls  by  its  infinity  of 
ordinances  and  restrictions ;  it  offends  by  professing  to 
help  those  whom  it  will  not  allow  to  help  themselves ; 
and  it  vexes  by  its  swarms  of  dictatorial  officials,  who  are 
forever  stepping  in  between  men  and  their  pursuits. 
Those  regulations  by  which  the  French  manufacturers, 
were  hampered  during  the  last  century,  when  the  state 


CAUSES   OF   REVOLUTION.  321 

decided  on  the  persons  to  be  employed,  the  articles  to  be 
made,  the  materials  to  be  used,  and  the  quantities  of  the 
products — when  inspectors  broke  the  looms  and  burnt  the 
goods  that  were  not  made  according  to  law — and  when 
improvements  were  illegal  and  inventors  were  fined — had 
no  small  share  in  producing  the  great  revolution.  Nor, 
amongst  the  causes  which  conspired  to  overthrow  the  gov 
ernment  of  Louis  Philippe,  must  we  forget  the  irritation 
generated  by  an  analogous  supervision,  under  which  a 
mine  cannot  be  opened  without  the  permission  of  the 
authorities ;  under  which  a  bookseller  or  printer  may 
have  his  business  suspended  by  the  withdrawal  of  his 
licence ;  and  under  which  it  is  penal  to  take  a  bucket  of 
water  out  of  the  sea. 

Thus,  if  we  regard  government  as  a  means  of  uphold 
ing  the  social  state,  we  find  that,  besides  suffering  a  direct 
loss  of  power  to  perform  its  duty  on  attempting  any  thing 
else,  there  are  several  subsidiary  ways  in  which  the  as 
sumption  of  additional  functions  endangers  the  fulfilment 
of  its  original  function. 

§  8.  But  we  have  not  sufficiently  considered  the 
infinite  presumption  discernible  in  this  attempt  at  regulat 
ing  all  the  doings  of  men  by  law.  To  make  up  for  defects 
in  the  original  constitution  of  things — this  is  the  meaning 
of  the  scheme,  nakedly  stated.  It  is  said  of  a  certain  per 
sonage,  that  he  wished  he  had  been  consulted  when  the 
world  was  being  made,  for  that  he  could  have  given  good 
advice ;  and  not  a  little  historical  celebrity  has  attached 
to  this  personage,  in  virtue  of  his  so-thought  unparalleled 
arrogance.  Shallow,  shallow  !  Why,  the  great  majority 
of  our  statesmen  and  politicians  do  as  much  every  day. 
Advice,  indeed!  they  do  not  stop  at  advice.  They 
actively  interpose,  take  into  their  own  hands  matters  that 
God  seems  to  be  mismanaging,  and  undertake  to  set  them 
14* 


322  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

right !  It  is  clear  to  them  that  social  wants  and  relation 
ships  have  been  so  carelessly  provided  for,  that  without 
their  vigilant  management  all  will  go  wrong.  As  for  any 
silent  influences  by  which  imperfections  are  in  process  of 
being  removed,  they  do  not  believe  in  them.  But  by  a 
commission,  a  staff  of  officers,  and  a  parliamentary  grant, 
every  deficiency  shall  be  made  good,  and  the  errors  of 
Omniscience  be  rectified ! 

In  truth  it  is  a  sad  sight  for  any  one  who  has  been, 
what  Bacon  recommends — "  a  servant  and  interpreter  of 
nature,"  to  see  these  political  schemers,  with  their  clumsy 
mechanisms,  trying  to  supersede  the  great  laws  of  exist 
ence.  Such  an  one,  no  longer  regarding  the  mere  outside 
of  things,  has  learned  to  look  for  the  secret  forces  by 
which  they  are  upheld.  After  patient  study,  this  chaos 
of  phenomena  into  the  midst  of  which  he  was  born  has 
begun  to  generalize  itself  to  him  ;  and  where  there  seemed 
nothing  but  confusion,  he  can  now  discern  the  dim  out 
lines  of  a  gigantic  plan.  No  accidents,  no  chance; 
but  everywhere  order  and  completeness.  One  by  one  ex 
ceptions  vanish,  and  all  becomes  systematic.  Suddenly 
what  had  appeared  an  anomaly  answers  to  some  intenser 
thought,  exhibits  polarity,  and  ranges  itself  along  with 
kindred  facts.  Throughout  he  finds  the  same  vital  princi 
ples,  ever  in  action,  ever  successful,  and  embracing  the 
minutest  details.  Growth  is  unceasing ;  and  though  slow, 
all  powerful :  showing  itself  here  in  some  rapidly-develop 
ing  outline  ;  and  there,  where  the  necessity  is  less,  exhib 
iting  only  the  fibrils  of  incipient  organization.  Irresisti 
ble  as  it  is  subtle,  he  sees  in  the  worker  of  these  changes, 
a  power  that  bears  onwards  peoples  and  governments 
regardless  of  their  theories,  and  schemes,  and  prejudices 
— a  power  which  sucks  the  life  out  of  their  lauded  institu 
tions,  shrivels  up  their  state-parchments  with  a  breath, 
paralyzes  long-venerated  authorities,  obliterates  the  most 


••*  x 


THE   INHERENT   ADJUSTMENTS   OF   THINGS.  323 

deeply-graven  laws,  makes  statesmen  recant  and  puts 
prophets  to  the  blush,  buries  cherished  customs,  shelves 
precedents,  and  which,  before  men  are  yet  conscious  of 
the  fact,  has  wrought  a  revolution  in  all  things,  and  filled 
the  world  with  a  higher  life.  Always  toward  perfection 
is  the  mighty  movement  —  toward  a  complete  develop 
ment  and  a  more  unmixed  good  ;  subordinating  in  its  uni 
versality  all  petty  irregularities  and  fallings  back,  as  the 
curvature  of  the  earth  subordinates  mountains  and  valleys. 
Even  in  evils,  the  student  learns  to  recognize  only  a  strug 
gling  beneficence.  But,  above  all,  he  is  struck  with  the 
inherent  suificingness  of  things,  and  with  the  complex 
simplicity  of  those  principles  by  which  every  defect  is 
being  remedied  —  principles  that  show  themselves  alike  in 
the  self-adjustment  of  planetary  perturbations,  and  in  the 
healing  of  a  scratched  finger  —  in  the  balancing  of  social 
systems,  and  in  the  increased  sensitiveness  of  a  blind 
man's  ear  —  in  the  adaptation  of  prices  to  produce,  and  in 
the  acclimatization  of  a  plant.  Day  by  day  he  sees  a 
further  beauty.  Each  new  fact  illustrates  more  clearly 
some  recognized  law,  or  discloses  some  inconceived  com 
pleteness  :  contemplation  thus  perpetually  discovering 
to  him  a  higher  harmony,  and  cherishing  in  him  a  deeper 
faith. 

And  now,  in  the  midst  of  his  admiration  and  his  awe, 
the  student  shall  suddenly  see  some  flippant  red-tapist  get 
upon  his  legs  and  tell  the  world  how  he  is  going  to  put  a 
patch  upon  nature  I  Here  is  a  man  who,  in  the  presence 
of  all  the  wonders  that  encompass  him,  dares  to  announce 
that  he  and  certain  of  his  colleagues  have  laid  their 
heads  together  and  found  out  a  way  to  improve  upon  the 
Divine  arrangements  !  Scarcely  an  idea  have  these  med 
dlers  got  of  what  underlies  the  facts  with  which  they  pro 
pose  to  deal;  as  you  shall  soon  find  on  sounding  their 
philosophy  :  and  yet,  could  they  carry  out  their  preten- 


324:  THE   LIMIT   OF   STATE-DUTY. 

sions,  we  should  see  them  self-appointed  nurses  to  the  uni 
verse  !  They  have  so  little  faith  in  the  laws  of  things, 
and  so  much  faith  in  themselves,  that,  were  it  possible, 
they  would  chain  earth  and  sun  together,  lest  centripetal 
force  should  fail !  Nothing  but  a  parliament-made  agency 
can  be  depended  upon ;  and  only  when  this  infinitely- 
complex  humanity  of  ours  has  been  put  under  their  in 
genious  regulations,  and  provided  for  by  their  supreme 
intelligence,  will  the  world  become  what  it  ought  to  be ! 
Such,  in  essence,  is  the  astounding  creed  of  these  creation- 
menders. 

§  9.  Consider  it  then  in  what  light  we  may — morally 
or  scientifically,  with  reference  to  its  practicableness^or 
as  a  question  of  political  prudence,  or  even  in  its  bearings 
upon  religious  faith — we  find  this  theory,  that  a  govern 
ment  ought  to  undertake  other  offices  besides  that  of  pro 
tector,  to  be  an  untenable  theory.  It  has  been  shown 
that  if  the  maintaining  of  rights  be  regarded  as  the  special 
function  of  the  state,  the  state  cannot  fulfil  any  other  func 
tion  without  a  partial  loss  of  power  to  fulfil  its  special  one. 
When,  from  another  point  of  view,  the  state  is  looked 
upon  as  an  aid  to  adaptation,  we  still  find  that  it  cannot 
exceed  its  duty  of  guarding  men's  liberties,  without  be 
coming  a  hindrance  to  adaptation,  instead  of  an  aid.  It 
turns  out  that  to  abolish  the  limit  of  legislative  interposi 
tion  now  contended  for,  is  in  fact  to  abolish  all  limits 
whatever — is  to  give  the  civil  power  a  field  of  action  to 
which  no  bounds  can  be  fixed,  save  in  some  arbitrary  and 
utterly  unphilosophical  way.  Moreover,  even  could  cer 
tain  supplementary  affairs,  considered  fit  for  government 
supervision,  be  duly  distinguished  from  the  rest,  there 
Avould  still  be  the  fact  that  all  experience  shows  gov 
ernment  to  be  an  incompetent  manager  of  such  sup 
plementary  affairs.  It  is  further  urged,  that  the  sys- 


EXTENSION   OF   THE   ARGUMENT   IN   DETAIL.  325 

tern  of  extended  official  control  is  bad,  because  unfa 
vourable  to  social  stability.  And,  finally,  that  system  is 
repudiated,  as  involving  an  absurd  and  even  impious  pre 
sumption. 


,  then,  are  the  general  arguments  brought  forward 
to  prove  that  whilst  the  state  ought  to  protect,  it  ought 
to  do  nothing  more  than  protectj  By  the  abstract  thinker 
they  may  perhaps  be  deemed  conclusive.  There  are  others, 
however,  with  whom  they  will  weigh  comparatively  little  ; 
and,  for  the  conviction  of  these,  it  will  be  needful  to  ex 
amine  in  detail  each  of  the  several  cases  in  which  legisla 
tive  superintendence  is  commonly  advocated.  Let  us 
now  proceed  to  do  this. 


&>£.'         /^<  " 

/£  "/£/..*  "0^    "*     ^^*-^-i*->     $, 

CHAPTEE    XXIII. 

*yr-  j  *  *• 

THE   REGULATION    OF    COMMERCE. 

§  1.  Arrangements  which  alter  the  natural^  course 
of  trade  are  of  two  kinds  ;  they  may  be  classed  as  either 
artificial  stimuli  or  artificial  restraints  —  bounties  or  re 
strictions. 

Of  bounties  must  here  be  said  specially  what  was  said 
in  the  last  chapter  of  factitious  advantages  generally  ; 
namely,  that  a  government  cannot  give  them  without  in 
directly  reversing  its  function.  Not  being  requisite  for 
the  due  maintenance  of  the  citizen's  rights,  the  taking 
away  of  his  property  for  the  purpose  of  encouraging  cer 
tain  branches  of  production,  would  be  wrong  even  were 
collateral  benefits  given  in  exchange  ;  and  as,  instead  of 
affording  him  collateral  benefits,  the  commercial  derange 
ments  consequent  upon  it  put  additional  limits  to  the  ex- 


326  THE   REGULATION    OF   COMMERCE. 

ercise  of  his  faculties,  such  a  measure  is  doubly  wrong. 
JSTow  that  the  faith  in  mercantile  bribes  is  nearly  extinct, 
it  is  needless  to  enforce  this  abstract  inference  by  any  sup 
plementary  reasoning. 

Of  restrictions  it  scarcely  needs  saying  that  they  are 
even  more  directly  inequitable  than  bounties.  Deducible 
as  it  is  from  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  the  right  of  ex 
change  is  as  sacred  as  any  other  right  (Chap.  XIII.),  and 
exists  as  much  between  members  of  different  nations  as 
between  members  of  the  same  nation.  /Morality  knows 
nothing  of  geographical  boundaries,  or  distinctions  of  race. 
You  may  put  men  on  opposite  sides  of  a  river  or  a  chain 
of  mountains ;  may  else  part  them  by  a  tract  of  salt  water ; 
may  give  them,  if  you  like,  distinct  languages ;  and  may 
even  colour  their  skins  differently ;  but  you  cannot  change 
their  fundamental  relationships.  Originating  as  these  do 
in  tlie  facts  of  man's  constitution,  they  are  unaltered  by 
the  accidents  of  external  condition.  The  moral  law  is 
cosmopolite — is  no  respecter  of  nationalities :  and  between 
men  who  are  the  antipodes  of  each  other,  either  in  locality 
or  any  thing  else,  there  must  still  exist  the  same  balance  of 
rights  as  though  they  were  next-door  neighbours  in  all 
things. 

Hence,  in  putting  a  veto  upon  the  commercial  inter 
course  of  two  nations,  or  in  putting  obstacles  in  the  way 
of  that  intercourse,  a  government  trenches  upon  men's 
liberties  of  action ;  and  by  so  doing  directly  reverses  its 
function.  To  secure  for  each  man  the  fullest  freedom  to 
exercise  his  faculties,  compatible  with  the  like  freedom  of 
all  others,  we  find  to  be  the  state's  duty.  Now  trade  pro 
hibitions  and  trade  restrictions  not  only  do  not  secure  this 
freedom,  but  they  take  it  away.  So  that  in  enforcing 
them  the  state  is  transformed  from  a  maintainer  of  rights 
into  a  violator  of  rights.  If  it  be  criminal  in  a  civil  power 
commissioned  to  shield  us  from  murder  to  turn  murderer 


EFFECTS   OF   TRADE-RESTRICTIONS.  327 


itself;  if  it  be  criminal  in  it  to  play  the  thief,  though  set 
to  keep  oif  thieves  ;  then  must  it  be  criminal  in  it  to  de 
prive  men,  in  any  way,  of  liberty  to  pursue  the  objects  of 
desire,  when  it  was  appointed  to  insure  them  that  liberty. 
Whether  it  kills,  or  robs,  or  enslaves,  or  shackles  by  trade 
regulations,  its  guilt  is  alike  in  kind,  and  differs  only  in 
degree.  In  one  extreme  it  wholly  destroys  the  power  to 
exercise  the  faculties  ;  in  the  other  it  does  this  partially. 
And  in  strict  ethics  the  same  species  of  condemnation  must 
be  visited  upon  it  in  both  cases.  > 

§  2.  Not  a  few  will  be  startled  by  this  view  of  the 
matter.  Let  such  reflect  awhile  upon  the  antecedents  and 
associations  of  this  trade-ruling.  They  will  find,  on  doing 
so,  that  it  is  allied  in  both  origin  and  practice  to  all  other 
forms  of  wrong.  More  than  once  it  has  been  pointed  out, 
that  as  unjust  customs  and  institutions  derive  their  vi- 
ciousness  from  a  moral  defect  in  the  people  living  under 
them,  they  must  be  uniformly  pervaded  by  that  vicious- 
ness  —  that  as  social  laws,  creeds,  and  arrangements  consist 
merely  of  solidified  character,  the  same  character  will  be 
shown  in  all  the  social  laws,  creeds,  and  arrangements 
which  coexist  ;  and,  further,  that  any  process  of  ameliora 
tion  will  affect  them  simultaneously.  This  truth  was 
amply  illustrated  (pp.  180  and  198).  We  saw  that  ty 
ranny  in  forms  of  government,  tyranny  in  the  conduct  of 
lord  to  serf,  tyranny  in  religious  organizations  and  disci 
pline,  tyranny  in  the  matrimonial  relationship,  and  tyranny 
in  the  treatment  of  children,  regularly  flourished  together 
and  regularly  decreased  at  a  like  rate.  In  the  same  cate 
gory  we  must  now  put  —  tyranny  in  commercial  laws. 
Sinking  those  minor  irregularities  which  pervade  all  na 
ture's  processes,  we  shall  find  that  from  the  days  when 
exportation  was  a  capital  crime,  down  to  our  own  free- 
trade  era,  there  has  been  a  constant  ratio  kept  between 


328  THE   REGULATION   OF   COMMERCE. 

the  stringency  of  mercantile  restraints  and  the  stringency 
of  other  restraints,  as  there  has  between  the  increase  of 
commercial  liberty  and  the  increase  of  general  liberty.*** 

A  few  facts  will  sufficiently  exemplify  this.  Take  as 
one  the  instance  just  alluded  to,  in  which  associated  with 
autocratic  rule  in  church,  in  state,  and  in  feudal  hall,  we 
find  Edward  III.,  for  the  purpose  of  making  foreigners 
come  and  buy  in  our  markets,  prohibiting  his  subjects 
from  sending  abroad  any  staple  goods  "  under  penalty  of 
death  and  confiscation ; "  and  further  enacting  "  that  the 
law  should  be  unalterable  either  by  himself  or  his  suc 
cessors."  Observe,  too,  how  this  same  despotic  spirit  was 
exhibited  in  the  regulations  requiring  these  continental 
traders  to  reside  during  their  stay  with  certain  inspectors 
commissioned  to  see  the  cargoes  sold  within  a  specified 
time,  and  the  proceeds  reinvested  in  English  goods,  and 
charged  to  transmit  to  the  Exchequer  periodical  state 
ments  of  each  merchant's  bargains — regulations,  by  the 
way,  of  which  the  abandonment  was  in  after  times  la 
mented  by  the  venerators  of  ancestral  wisdom,  much  as 
the  abolition  of  the  sliding  scale  is  mourned  over  by  a 
certain  party  of  our  own  day.  Note  again  how,  under 
the  same  regime,  labourers  were  coerced  into  working  for 
fixed  wages ;  and  then  how,  to  keep  the  balance  even, 
shopkeepers  had  the  prices  of  provisions  dictated  to  them. 
Mark  further,  that  when  the  most  tyrannical  of  these  or 
dinances  fell  into  disuse,  there  still  continued  the  less  bur 
densome  ones,  such  as  those  usury  laws,  orders  to  farmers, 
prescribings  of  the  material  for  grave-clothes,  instructions 
to  manufacturers,  &c.,  referred  to  in  the  last  chapter. 
But  without  going  into  further  detail — without  enlarging 
upon  the  fact  that  those  intolerable  restraints  once  borne 
by  the  manufacturing  classes  of  France  were  cotemporary 
with  intense  despotism  at  court,  and  a  still  lingering  feu 
dalism  in  the  provinces — without  tracing  the  parallelism 


IMPLICATIONS   OF  TEADE-EESTEICTION.  329 

that  exists  between  the  political  and  commercial  bondage, 
under  which,  in  spite  of  their  revolutions,  the  French  still 
live — without  pointing  out  at  length  the  same  connection 
of  phenomena  in  Prussia,  in  Austria,  and  in  other  simi 
larly-ruled  countries — without  doing  all  this,  the  evidence 
adduced  sufficiently  shows  that  the  oppressiveness  of  a 
nation's  mercantile  laws  varies  as  the  oppressiveness  of  its 
general  arrangements  and  government.  Whilst,  con 
versely,  if  we  glance  over  the  annals  of  progress,  and 
then  contemplate  the  changes  that  have  taken  place  within 
these  few  years,  or  which  are  yet  in  progress,  we  cannot 
but  remark  a  similar  kinship  between  the  manifestations 
of  a  juster  feeling  in  political  organization,  in  ecclesiasti 
cal  affairs,  in  the  family,  and  in  our  commercial  code. 

Thus,  trade  restrictions  are  of  the  same  race  with  irre 
sponsible  government  and  slavery.  An  obtuse  perception 
of,  and  an  insufficient  sympathy  with,  the  claims  of  man, 
are  the  parents  of  all  tyrannies  and  dishonesties,  bear  they 
what  name  they  may.  Interferences  with  the  freedom  of 
exchange  are  as  certainly  their  progeny  as  are  the  worst 
violations  of  human  rights :  they  are  constantly  found  in 
the  society  of  these :  and  though  not  popularly  classed  as 
crimes,  they  are  in  both  origin  and  nature  closely  related 
to  them. 

§  3.  There  is  another  aspect  under  which  these  trade 
regulations,  in  common  with  many  kindred  contrivances 
for  the  management  of  social  affairs,  may  be  regarded. 
They  are  all  in  essence  idolatrous.  The  worship  of  dead, 
powerless  things  made  with  human  hands  is  not  extinct, 
as  people  flatter  themselves — cannot  be  extinct — never 
will  be  entirely  extinct.  The  elements  of  man's  nature 
are  persistent :  the  change  is  in  their  ratios.  Typical  re 
mains  of  every  disposition  must  continue  traceable  even 
to  the  remotest  future.  If,  on  the  one  hand,  it  is  an  error 


330  THE  REGULATION   OF  COMMEECE. 

to  suppose  that  humanity  has  not  altered  at  all,  it  is,  on 
the  other  hand,  an  error  to  suppose  that  it  has  altered,  or 
even  will  alter,  so  completely  as  to  retain  no  traces  of  its 
bygone  character. 

Scientifically  defined,  idolatry  is  a  mode  of  thought 
under  which  all  causation  is  attributed  to  entities.  It  re 
sults  from  the  first  generalization  of  the  undeveloped  in 
tellect,  which,  having  constantly  seen  results  produced  by 
visible,  tangible  objects,  infers  that  all  results  are  so  pro 
duced.  In  the  mind  of  the  savage  every  effect  is  believed 
tQ  be  due  to  a  special  worker,  because  special  workers 
have  been  observed  to  precede  effects  in  a  multitude  of  in 
stances.  The  laws  of  mental  action  necessitate  that,  as  all 
known  causes  have  presented  themselves  to  him  as  per 
sonal  agencies,  all  unknown  causes  must  be  conceived  by 
him  of  the  same  nature.  Hence  the  original  fetishism.  /  A 
stone  thrown  by  an  unseen  hand,  a  piece  of  wood  that, 
when  heated,  bursts  into  flame,  or  an  animal  found  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  some  natural  catastrophe,  is  at  once  as 
sumed  to  be  the  acting  power.  Here  is  a  phenomena — a 
visible  change  of  state  in  some  observed  object :  past  ex 
perience  inevitably  suggests  that  there  is  a  worker  of  this 
change :  past  experience  also  inevitably  suggests  that  such 
worker  is  an  entity :  the  entity  to  which  the  character  of 
worker  is  ultimately  ascribed  will  be  that  which  past  ex 
perience  points  out  as  most  probable :  and,  in  the  absence 
of  other  entities,  this  character  of  worker  will  attach  to 
the  wood  that  gives  out  the  flame,  or  to  the  stone  that  in 
flicts  the  blow.  Thus  the  wood  and  stone,  being  looked 
upon  as  agents  of  unknown  power  capable  of  inflicting  in 
jury,  are  prayed  to  and  propitiated. 

From  the  very  first,  however,  there  begins  an  accumu 
lation  of  facts  calculated  to  undermine  this  theory  of 
things,  and  certain  ultimately  to  overthrow  it.  SFor, 
whilst  he  regards  all  phenomena  as  the  doings  of  living 


GROWTH   OF  THE   CONCEPTION  OF   LAW.  331 

beings,  the  primitive  man   necessarily  attributes  to  such 
beings  qualities  similar  to  those  of  the  being  he  sees — men 
and  brutes.     Reasoning,  as  he  must,  from  the  known  to 
the  unknown,  he  is  obliged  to  conceive  the  unknown  gen 
erators  of  change  to  be  like  the  known  ones  in  all  things : 
and  we  find  that  he  does  this ;  we  find  that  he  represents 
them  by  forms  either  human,  or  bestial,  or  both,  that  he 
imagines  their  passions  and  habits  to  be  like  his  own. 
Now  an  attribute,  possessed  in  common  by  all  the  beings 
known  to  him,  is  that  of  irregular  volition.     He  sees  no 
creature  whose  acts  are  so  uniform  that  he  can  say  posi 
tively  what  its  future  behaviour  will  be.     Hence  it  hap 
pens  that  when  certain  natural  events,  originally  ascribed 
by  him  to  living  agents — events  such  as  the  rising  and 
setting  of  the  sun  and  the  falling  of  bodies  to  the  earth — 
come  to  be  perpetually  repeated,  and  follow  the  same  an 
tecedents  without  exception,  his  notion  of  personal  agency 
is  shaken.     This  perfect  uniformity  of  action  is  at  variance 
with  his  knowledge  of  all  known  beings — is  at  variance 
with  his  very  conception  of  a  being.     And  thus  in  respect 
to  the  most  familiar  sequences,  experience  silently  forces 
upon  him  the  idea  of  a  constant  course  of  procedure — or 
what  we  express  by  the  word  law  •  and  a  belief  in  imper 
sonal  agency  slowly  supplants  the  original  belief  in  per 
sonal  agency.     This  revolution  in  his  mode  of  thinking, 
though  at  first  confined  to  the  every-day  instances  of  cau 
sation,  extends  in  process  of  time  to  a  wider  and  wider 
range   of  cases.      The  unceasing   accumulation   of  facts 
which  begins  when  increase  of  population  provides  a  mul 
titude  of  observers,  continually  furnishes  new  illustrations 
of  that  uniformity  of  sequence  which  conflicts  with  the 
notion  of  special  workers ;  and  thus  the  domain  of  the  so- 
called  supernatural  is  step  by  step  usurped  by  the  so-called 
natural.      Still,  it  is   only  in    as   far   as   uniformity  of 
sequence  is  made  abundantly  manifest,  that  the  old  theory 


332  THE  REGULATION   OF   COMMERCE. 

is  superseded.  Though,  amongst  the  Greeks,  Thales 
taught  that  there  were  laws  of  matter,  he  nevertheless 
considered  that  a  load-stone  had  a  soul.  Where  the 
occurrence  is  unusual — that  is,  where  the  connection  be 
tween  antecedent  and  consequent  is  not  familiar — that  is, 
where  circumstances  do  not  discountenance  the  original 
belief  in  special  workers,  that  belief  is  still  held.  Hence 
it  happens  that,  long  after  all  ordinary  phenomena  have 
come  to  be  considered  as  due  to  the  properties  of  things, 
or,  in  other  words,  to  impersonal  agency,  such  an  event 
as  an  eclipse  or  an  earthquake  is  explained  as  a  dragon 
eating  the  sun,  or  as  a  god  turning  over  in  his  sleep ;  an 
epidemic  is  ascribed  to  witchcraft ;  a  luminous  whiff  of 
marsh-gas-  is  regarded  as  a  "  Will  o'  the  whisp ;  "  a  failure 
in  the  dairy  or  brewhouse  is  set  down  to  fairy  malice ;  and 
there  are  myths  about  Giants'  Causeways  and  Devils' 
Bridges.  Where  the  connection  between  cause  and  effect 
is  very  remote  or  obscure,  as  in  matters  of  fortune  and  in 
certain  bodily  affections,  this  disposition  to  attribute  pow 
er  to  entities  continues  even  after  science  has  made  great 
progress  ;  and  thus  we  find  that  in  our  own  day  the  old ' 
fetishism  still  lingers  in  the  regard  shown  to  crooked  six 
pences,  wart-charms,  and  omens. 

It  lingers,  moreover,  as  already  hinted,  in  less  suspected 
forms.  Many  much-reverenced  social  instrumentalities, 
also,  have  originated  in  this  primitive  necessity  of  ascrib 
ing  all  causation  to  special  workers — this  inability  to  de 
tach  the  idea  of  force  from  an  individual  something.  Just 
in  proportion  as  natural  phenomena  are  recorded  by  any 
people  as  of  personal  instead  of  impersonal  origin,  will 
the  phenomena  of  national  life  be  similarly  construed : 
and,  indeed,  since  moral  sequences  are  less  obvious  than 
physical  ones,  they  will  be  thus  construed  even  more 
generally.  "The  old  belief  that  a  king  could  fix  the  value 
of  coinage,  and  the  cry  raised  at  the  change  of  style — • 


>\     <*          •  *  t-°v- 

DECLINE   OF   POLITICAL   FETISHISM.  333 

"  Give  us  our  eleven  days,"  obviously  implied  minds  in 
capable  of  conceiving  social  affairs  to  be  regulated  by 
other  than  visible,  tangible  agencies.  That  there  should 
be  at  work  some  unseen  but  universally-diffused  influ 
ence  determining  the  buy  ings  and  sellings  of  citizens  and 
the  transactions  of  merchants  from  abroad,  in  a  way  the 
most  advantageous  to  all  parties,  was  an  idea  as  foreign 
to  such  minds  as  was  that  of  uniform  physical  causation 
to  the  primitive  Greeks ;  *  and,  conversely,  as  the  primi 
tive  Greeks  could  understand  the  operations  of  nature 
being  performed  by  a  number  of  presiding  individualities, 
so  to  the  people  of  the  middle  ages  it  was  comprehensible 
that  a  proper  production  and  distribution  of  commodities 
should  be  ensured  by  acts  of  Parliament  and  government 
officials.  /  Whilst  the  due  regulation  of  trade  by  a  natural 
indestructible  force  was  inconceivable  to  them,  they  could 
conceive  trade  to  be  duly  regulated  by  a  force  resident  in 
some  material  instrumentality  put  together  by  legislators, 
clothed  in  the  robes  of  office,  painted  by  court  flatterers, 
and  decorated  with  "jewels  five  words  long."f 

But  with  the  complex  phenomena  of  commerce,  as 
with  the  simpler  phenomena  of  the  inorganic  world,  con 
stancy  of  sequence  has  gradually  undermined  the  theory 
that  powrer  dwells  in  entities.  Irresistible  evidence  is  at 
length  establishing  a  belief  in  the  law  of  supply  and  de 
mand,  as  some  thousands  of  years  ago  it  established  a 
belief  in  the  law  of  gravitation.  And  the  development  of 
politico-economical  science,  being  thus  a  further  conquest 
of  the  faith  in  impersonal  agencies  over  the  faith  in  per 
sonal  agencies,  must  be  regarded  as  one  of  that  series  of 
changes  which  commenced  wi^  the  first  victory  of  natural 
philosophy  over  superstition. 

*  See  Grote's  History. 

f  A  metaphor  that  has  been  used  to  denote  the  pride  with  which  the 
German  officials  regard  their  titles. 


334  THE  REGULATION   OF   COMMERCE. 

§  4.  Fortunately  it  is  now  needless  to  enforce  the 
doctrine  of  commercial  freedom  by  any  considerations  of 
policy.  After  making  continual  attempts  to  improve 
upon  the  laws  of  trade,  from  the  time  of  Solon  down 
wards,  men  are  at  length  beginning  to  see  that  such 
attempts  are  worse  than  useless.  Political  economy  has 
shown  us  in  this  matter — what  indeed  it  is  its  chief  mis 
sion  to  show — that  our  wisest  plan  is  to  let  things  take 
their  own  course.  An  increasing  sense  of  justice,  too,  has 
assisted  in  convincing  us.  We  have  here  learned,  what 
our  forefathers  learned  in  some  cases,  and  what,  alas  !  we 
have  yet  to  learn  in  many  more,  that  nothing  but  evil  can 
arise  from  inequitable  regulations.  The  necessity  of.  re 
specting  the  principles  of  abstract  rectitude — this  it  is 
that  we  have  had  another  lesson  upon.  Look  at  it  rightly 
and  we  shall  find  that  all  the  Anti-Corn-Law  League  did, 
with  its  lectures,  its  newspapers,  its  bazaars,  its  monster 
meetings,  and  its  tons  of  tracts,  was  to  teach  people — what 
should  have  been  very  clear  to  them  without  any  such 
teaching — that  no  good  can  come  of  violating  men's  rights. 
By  bitter  experience  and  a  world  of  talk  we  have  at  length 
been  made  partially  to  believe  as  much.  Be  it  true  or 
not  in  other  cases,  we  are  now  quite  certain  that  it  is  true 
in  trade.  In  respect  to  this  at  least  we  have  declared 
that,  for  the  future,  we  will  obey  the  law  of  equal 
freedom. 


CHAPTER    XXIY. 

RELIGIOUS    ESTABLISHMENTS. 

§  1.  As  a  matter  of  routine,  it  is  needful  here  to 
point  out  what  the  reader  will  have  inferred  from  Chap. 
XXII.,  that,  by  devoting  a  portion  of  its  revenues  or  a 


ALL   STATE-CHUKCHES   ESSENTIALLY   POPISH.          335 

part  of  the  nation's  property  to  the  propagation  of  Chris 
tianity  or  any  other  creed,  a  government  necessarily  com 
mits  a  wrong.  If,  as  with  ourselves,  such  government 
forcibly  takes  a  citizen's  money  for  the  support  of  a 
national  church,  it  is  guilty  of  infringing  the  rights  it 
ought  to  maintain — of  trespassing  upon  that  freedom  to 
exercise  the  faculties  which  it  was  qommissioned  to  guard. 
For,  as  already  shown,  by  diminishing  a  subject's  liberty 
of  action  more  than  is  needful  for  securing  the  remainder, 
the  civil  power  becomes  an  aggressor  instead  of  a  protec 
tor.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  right  to  ignore  the  state 
is  recognized,  as,  in  considering  the  question  abstractedly, 
we  must  suppose  it  to  be,  then,  by  insisting  upon  condi 
tions  which  drive  some  men  to  abandon  its  aid,  and  which 
unnecessarily  restrict  the  freedom  of  those  who  do  not, 
the  state  fails  to  that  extent  in  discharging  its  duty. 
Hence,  specifically  applying  the  principle  lately  set  forth 
in  general  terms,  we  find  that  a  government  cannot  under 
take  the  teaching  of  a  religious  faith  without  cither  directly 
reversing  its  function,  or  partially  incapacitating  itself  for 
the  performance  of  that  function. 

§  2.  In  the  conduct  of  English  churchmen  we  have 
a  curious  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  men  will  re- 
adopt,  when  it  is  thinly  disguised,  a  belief  they  had  indig 
nantly  cast  from  them.  That  same  Romish  dogmatism, 
against  which  our  clergy  exclaim  with  such  vehemence, 
they  themselves  defend  when  it  is  exercised  on  behalf  of 
their  own  creed.  ^  Every  state-church  is  essentially  popish. 
We  also  have  a  Vatican — St.  Stephen's.  It  is  true  that 
our  arch-priest  is  a  composite  one.  It  is  true  that  with  us 
the  triple  tiara  is  separated  into  its  parts — one  for  monarch, 
one  for  peers,  and  one  for  commons.  But  this  fact  makes 
no  difference.  In  substance,  popery  is  the  assumption  of 
infallibility.  It  matters  not  in  principle  whether  this 


336  RELIGIOUS   ESTABLISHMENTS. 

assumption  is  made  by  one  man,  or  by  an  assembly  of  men. 
ISTo  doubt  the  astounding  announcement — "  You  must  be 
lieve  what  we  say  is  right,  and  not  what  you  think  is  right," 
comes  less  offensively  from  the  lips  of  a  parliamentary  ma 
jority  than  from  those  of  a  single  individual.  But  there  still 
arises  the  question — By  what  authority  do  these  men  assert 
this  ?  Whence  do  they  derive  their  infallibility  ? 

That  in  establishing  any  religion  a  government  does 
claim  to  be  infallible,  scarcely  needs  proof.  ,'  Before  a 
church  organization  can  be  set  to  work,  a  distinct  under 
standing  as  to  what  it  is  to  do  must  be  arrived  at.  Be 
fore  state-paid  ministers  can  be  set  to  preach,  it  must  first 
be  decided  wliat  they  are  to  preach.  And  who  is  to  say  ? 
Clearly  the  state.  Either  it  must  itself  elaborate  a  creed, 
or  it  must  depute  some  man  or  men  to  do  so.  It  must  in 
some  way  sift  out  truth  from  error,  and  cannot  escape  the 
responsibility  attending  this.  If  it  undertakes  itself  to 
settle  the  doctrines  to  be  taught,  it  is  responsible.  If  it 
adopts  a  ready-made  set  of  doctrines,  it  is  equally  respon 
sible.  And  if  i|  selects  its  doctrines  by  proxy,  it  is  still 
responsible ;  both  as  appointing  those  who  choose  for  it, 
and  as  approving  their  choice/'  Hence,  to  say  that  a  gov 
ernment  ought  to  set  up  and  maintain  a  system  of  relig 
ious  instruction,  is  to  say  that  it  ought  to  pick  out  from 
amongst  the  various  tenets  that  men  hold  or  have  held, 
those  which  are  right ;  and  that,  when  it  has  done  this — 
when  it  has  settled  between  the  Roman  Catholic,  the 
Greek,  the  Lutheran,  and  the  Anglican  creeds,  or  between 
the  Puseyite,  High  Church,  and  Evangelical  ones — when 
it  has  decided  whether  we  should  be  baptized  during  in 
fancy  or  at  a  mature  age,  whether  the  truth  is  with  Trini 
tarians  or  Unitarians,  whether  men  are  saved  by  faith  or 
by  works,  whether  pagans  go  to  hell  or  not,  whether  min 
isters  should  preach  in\black  or  white,  whether  confirma 
tion  is  scriptural,  whether  or  not  'saints'  days  should  be 


THE   ASSUMPTION   OF   INFALLIBILITY.  337 

kept,  and  (as  we  have  lately  seen  it  debating)  whether 
baptism  does  or  does  not  regenerate — when,  in  short,  it 
has  settled  all  those  controversies  which  have  split  man 
kind  into  innumerable  sects,  it  ought  to  assert  that  its 
judgment  is  incapable  of  error — is  unquestionable — is  be 
yond  appeal.  There  is  no  alternative.  Unless  the  state 
says  this,  it  convicts  itself  of  the  most  absurd  inconsis 
tency.  Only  on  the  supposition  of  infallibility  can  its 
ecclesiastical  doings  be  made  to  seem  tolerable.  How 
else  shall  it  demand  rates  and  tithes  of  the  dissenter? 
What  answer  can  it  make  to  his  expostulations  ?  "  Are 
you  quite  sure  about  these  doctrines  of  yours  ?  "  inquires 
the  dissenter.  " No"  replies  the  state ;  " not  quite  sure, 
but  nearly  so."  "  Then  it  is  just  possible  you  may  be 
wrong,  is  it  not  ?  "  "  Yes."  "And  it  is  just  possible  that 
I  may  be  right,  is  it  not  ?  "  "  Yes."  "  Yet  you  threaten 
to  inflict  penalties  upon  me  for  nonconformity !  You  seize 
my  goods ;  you  imprison  me  if  I  resist ;  and  all  to  force 
from  me  the  means  to  preach  up  doctrines  which  you 
admit  may  be  false,  and  by  implication  to  preach  down 
doctrines  which  you  admit  may  be  true  !  How  do  you 
justify  this  ?  ^  ~No  reply.  Evidently,  therefore,  if  the 
state  persist $|  the  only  position  open  to  it  is  that  its  judg 
ment  cannot  be  mistaken — that  its  doctrines  cannot  be 
erroneous, "  And  now  observe,  that  if  it  says  this,  it  stands 
committed  to  the  whole  Roman  Catholic  discipline  as 
well  as  to  its  theory.  Having  a  creed  that  is  beyond  the 
possibility  of  doubt,  and  being  commissioned  to  dissemi 
nate  that  creedj'  the  state  is  in  duty  bound  to  employ  the 
most  efficient  means  of  doing  this — is  bound  to  put  down 
all  adverse  teachers,  as  usurping  its  function  and  hinder 
ing  the  reception  of  its  unquestionable  doctrine — is  bound 
to  use  as  much  force  as  may  be  needful  for  doing  this — is 
bound,  therefore,  to  imprison,  to  fine,  and  if  necessary,  to 
inflict  severer  penalties,  so  that  error  may  be  exterminated 
15 


338  RELIGIOUS    ESTABLISHMENTS. 

and  truth  be  triumphant.  There  is  no  half-way.  Being 
charged  to  put  men  in  the  way  to  heaven,  it  cannot  with 
out  sin  permit  some  to  be  led  the  other  way.T/If,  rather 
than  punish  a  few  on  earth,  it  allows  many  to  be  eternally 
damned  for  misbelief,  it  is  manifestly  culpable.  Evidently 
it  must  do  all,  or  it  must  do  nothing.  If  it  does  not  claim 
infallibility,  it  cannot  in  reason  set  up  a  national  religion ; 
and  if,  by  setting  up  a  national  religion,  it  does  claim  in 
fallibility,  it  ought  to  coerce  all  men  into  the  belief  of  that 
religion. 7"  Thus,  as  was  said,  every  state-church  is  essen 
tially  popish. 

§  3.  But  there  has  been  gradually  dawning  upon 
those  who  think,  the  conviction  that  a  state-church  is  not 
so  much  a  religious  as  a  political  institution.  "  Who  does 
not  see,"  inquires  Locke,  speaking  of  the  clergy,  "  that 
these  men  are  more  ministers  of  the  government  than  min 
isters  of  the  gospel?"  Probably  in  Locke's  time  there 
were  few  who  did  see  this ;  but  there  are  now  many. 
Nor,  indeed,  is  the  fact  altogether  denied,  as  you  shall 
hear  from  some  politic  supporter  of  religious  establish 
ments  during  an  after-dinner  confidence.  "  Between  our 
selves,"  will  whisper  such  an  one,  "  these  churches  and 
parsons,  and  all  the  rest  of  it,  are  not  for  sensible  men, 
such  as  you  and  I ;  we  know  better ;  we  can  do  without 
all  that ;  but  there  must  be  something  of  the  kind  to  keep 
the  people  in  order."  *  And  then  he  will  go  on  to  show 
what  influential  restraints  religious  services  are ;  how 
they  encourage/subordination  and  contentment  p  and  how 
I  the  power  which  the  clergy  obtain  over  their  parishioners 
strengthens  the  hands  of  the  civil  ruler?  That  some  such 
view  widely  prevails  may  be  gathered  from  the  acts  and 
proposals  of  our  statesmen.  /How  otherwise  can  we  under 
stand  that  avowed  willingness  in  the  political  leaders  of 

*  The  writer  has  himself  been  thus  addressed. 


THE   STATE-CHUECII   A   POLITICAL    INSTITUTION.       339 

all  parties  to  endow  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  in  Ire 
land  if  the  religious  public  of  England  would  let  them  ? 
Or  what  but  a  political  motive  can  that  States'  lieutenant 
— the  East  India  Company — have  for  giving  an  annual 
subsidy  of  23,000  rupees  to  the  temple  of  Juggernaut, 
reimbursing  itself  by  a  tax  upon  the  pilgrims  ?  Or  why 
else  should  the  Ceylon  government  take  upon  itself  to  be 
curator  of  Buddha's  tooth,  and  to  commission  the  Budd 
hist  priests  ?  *  . 

§  4.  Of  the  clergy  who,  on  the  other  hand,  com 
monly  advocate  a  state-church  as  being  needful  for  the 
upholding  of  religion,  it  may  be  said  that  by  doing  this 
they  condemn  their  own  case,  pass  sentence  upon  their 
creed  as  worthless,  and  bring  themselves  in  guilty  of 
hypocrisy.  What !  will  they  allow  this  faith,  which  they 
value  so  highly,  to  die  a  natural  death  if  they  are  not  paid 
for  propagating  it  ?  Must  all  these  people,  about  whose 
salvation  they  profess  such  anxiety,  be  left  to  go  to  perdi 
tion  if  livings,  and  canonries,  and  bishoprics,  are  abol 
ished?  Has  that  apostolic  inspiration,  of  which  they 
claim  to  be  the  inheritors,  brought  with  it  so  little  apos 
tolic  zeal  that  there  would  be  no  preaching  were  it  not  for 
parsonages  and  tithes  ?  Do  they  who,  on  ordination,  de 
clared  themselves  "  inwardly  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost," 
now  find  that  they  are  inwardly  moved  only  by  the  chink 
of  gold  ?  This  would  be  called  slander  coming  from  any 
but  themselves.  And  then  their  flocks — what  say  they  of 
these  ?  Do  these  care  so  little  for  the  faith  they  have 
been  taught,  that  its  maintenance  cannot  be  entrusted 
to  them?  After  centuries  of  church-culture,  has  Chris 
tianity  got  so  little  root  in  men's  hearts  that  but  for  gov 
ernment  watering-pots  it  must  wither  away  ?  Are  we  to 
understand  that  these  'perpetual  -prayers  and  sacraments, 
*  See  letter  of  Sir  Colin  Campbell  to  Lord  Stanley,  May  2,  1845. 


340  RELIGIOUS   ESTABLISHMENTS. 

these  homilies  and  exhortations,  these  visitings  and  scrip 
ture-readings,  have  not  even  generated  as  much  enthusiasm 
as  can  keep  itself  alive  ?  Have  ten  thousand  sermons  a 
week  done  so  little  that  the  hearers  will  not  contribute  a 
sum  sufficient  for  the  sustentation  of  a  ministry  ?  Why, 
if  this  be  true,  what  is  the  system  good  for?  These  advo 
cates  do  but  open  their  briefs,  and  then  straightway  argue 
themselves  out  of  court.  /  They  labour  to  prove  either  hoAv 
powerless  is  the  faith  they  teach,  or  how  miserably  they 
teach  it !  The  sum  and  substance  of  their  plea  for  the 
state  propagation  of  this  creed  is,  that  it  has  failed  in 
animating  its  ministers  with  its  own  spirit  of  self-sacrifice, 
and  failed  to  arouse  in  its  devotees  a  spark  of  its  own 
generosity ! 

§  5.  It  is  needless,  however,  in  this  year  of  grace 
1850,  with  its  Gorham  controversies  and  Puseyite  divis 
ions,  with  its  Romish  and  Rationalist  secessions,  with  con 
fusion  inside  the  church,  and  a  hostile  association  outside 
— to  debate  the  question  at  greater  length.  Events  are 
proving  to  most  of  the  reflective — even  to  many  of  the 
clergy  themselves — that  a  state-support  of  any  particular 
faith  is  wrong,  and  that  in  England  at  least,  it  must 
shortly  cease.  For  those  who  do  not  yet  see  this  there 
are  already  volumes  of  argument  to  which  addition  is 
almost  superfluous.  The  conclusions  above  come  to,  that 
the  state  cannot  establish  a  religion  without  assuming  in 
fallibility,  and  that  to  argue  an  establishment  of  it  need 
ful  is  to  condemn  the  religion  itself,  will  sufficiently  en 
force,  for  present  purposes,  our  abstract  proposition. 


SHALL   GOVERNMENT   RELIEVE   THE   POOR 

• 

CHAPTEE    XXY. 

POOE-LAWS. 

§  1.  In  common  with  its  other  assumptions  of  sec 
ondary  offices,  the  assumption  by  a  government  of  the 
office  of  Reliever-general  to  the  poor,  is  necessarily  forbid 
den  by  the  principle  that  a  government  cannot  rightly  do 
any  thing  more  than  protect.  In  demanding  from  a  citi 
zen  contributions  for  the  mitigation  of  distress — contribu 
tions  not  needed  for  the  due  administration  of  men's 
rights — the  state  is,  as  we  have  seen,  reversing  its  func 
tion,  and  diminishing  that  liberty  to  exercise  the  faculties 
which  it  was  instituted  to  maintain.  Possibly,  unmindful 
of  the  explanations  already  given,  some  will  assert  that 
by  satisfying  the  wants  of  the  pauper,  a  government  is  in 
reality  extending  his  liberty  to  exercise  his  faculties,  inas 
much  as  it  is  giving  him  something  without  which  the  ex 
ercise  of  them  is  impossible ;  and  that  hence,  though  it 
decreases  the  rate-payer's  sphere  of  action,  it  compensates 
by  increasing  that  of  the  rate-receiver.  But  this  state 
ment  of  the  case  implies  a  confounding  of  two  widely- 
different  things.  To  enforce  the  fundamental  law — to  take 
care  that  every  man  has  freedom  to  do  all  that  he  wills, 
provided  he  infringes  not  the  equal  freedom  of  any  other 
man — this  is  the  special  purpose  for  which  the  civil  power 
exists.  Now  insuring  to  each  the  right  to  pursue  within 
the  specified  limits  the  objects  of  his  desires  without  let 
or  hindrance,  is  quite  a  separate  thing  from  insuring  him 
satisfaction.  Of  two  individuals,  one  may  use  his  liberty 
of  action  successfully — may  achieve  the  gratifications  he 
seeks  after,  or  accumulate  what  is  equivalent  to  many  of 
them — property ;  whilst  the  other,  having  like  privileges, 
may  fail  to  do  so.  But  with  these  results  the  state  has  no 


34:2  POOR-LAWS. 

• 

concern/  All  that  lies  within  its  commission  is  to  see  that 
each  man  is  allowed  to  use  such  powers  and  opportunities 
as  he*  possesses ;  and  if  it  takes  from  him  who  has  pros 
pered  to  give  to  him  who  has  not,  it  violates  its  duty 
toward  the  one  to  do  more  than  its  duty  toward  the  other.- 
Or,  repeating  the  idea  elsewhere  expressed  (p.  306),  it 
breaks  down  the  vital  law  of  society,  that  it  may  effect 
what  social  vitality  does  not  call  for. 

§  2.  The  notion  popularized  by  Cobbett,  that  every 
one  has  a  right  to  a  maintenance  out  of  the  soil,  leaves 
those  who  adopt  it  in  an  awkward  predicament.  Do  but 
ask  them  to  specify,  and  they  are  set  fast.  Assent  to  their 
principle ;  tell  them  you  will  assume  their  title  to  be  valid; 
and  then,  as  a  needful  preliminary  to  the  liquidation  of 
their  claim,  ask  for  some  precise  definition  of  it — inquire 
"  What  is  a  maintenance  ?  "  They  are  dumb.  "  Is  it," 
say  you,  "  potatoes  and  salt,  with  rags  and  a  mud  cabin  ? 
or  is  it  bread  and  bacon,  in  a  two-roomed  cottage  ?  Will 
a  joint  on  Sundays  suffice?  or  does  the  demand  include 
meat  and  malt  liquor  daily  ?  Will  tea,  coffee,  and  tobacco 
be  expected  ?  and  if  so,  how  many  ounces  of  each  ?  Are 
bare  walls  and  brick  floors  all  that  is  needed  ?  or  must 
there  be  carpets  and  paper-hangings  ?  Are  shoes  consid 
ered  essential  ?  or  will  the  Scotch  practice  be  approved  ? 
Shall  the  clothing  be  of  fustian  ?  if  not,  of  what  quality 
must  the  broadcloth  be  ?  In  short,  just  point  out  where, 
between  the  two  extremes  of  starvation  and  luxury,  this 
something  called  a  maintenance  lies."  Again  they  are 
dumb.  You  expostulate.  You  explain  that  nothing  can 
be  done  until  the  question  is  satisfactorily  answered.  You 
show  that  the  claim  must  be  reduced  to  a  detailed,  intelli 
gible  shape  before  a  step  can  be  taken  toward  its  settle 
ment.  "  How  else,"  you  ask,  "  shall  we  know  whether 
enough  has  been  awarded,  or  whether  too  much?"  Still 


THE   CLAIM  TO   A  MAINTENANCE.  343 

% 

they  are  dumb.  And,  indeed,  there  is  no  possible  reply 
for  them.  Opinions  they  may  offer  in  plenty ;  but  not  a 
precise,  unanimous  answer.  One  thinks  that  a  bare*  sub 
sistence  is  all  that  can  fairly  be  demanded.  Here  is 
another  who  hints  at  something  beyond  mere  necessaries. 
A  third  maintains  that  a  few  of  the  enjoyments  of  life 
should  be  provided  for.  And  some  of  the  more  consist 
ent,  pushing  the  doctrine  to  its  legitimate  result,  will  rest 
satisfied  with  nothing  short  of  community  of  property. 
Who  now  shall  decide  amongst  these  conflicting  notions  ? 
Or,  rather,  how  shall  their  propounders  be  brought  to  an 
agreement  ?  Can  any  one  of  them  prove  that  his  defini 
tion  is  tenable  and  the  others  not  ?  Yet  he  must  do  this 
if  he  would  make  out  a  case.  Before  he  can  prosecute  his 
claim  against  society,  in  the  high  court  of  morality,  he 
must  "file  his  bill  of  particulars."  If  he  accomplishes 
this  he  is  entitled  to  a  hearing.  If  not,  he  must  evidently 
be  non-suited. 

The  right  to  labour — that  French  translation  of  our 
poor-law  doctrine — may  be  similarly  treated,  A  criticism 
parallel  to  the  foregoing  would  place  its  advocates  in  a 
parallel  dilemma.  But  there  is  another  way  in  which  the 
fallacy  of  this  theory,  either  in  its  English  or  its  conti 
nental  form,  may  be  made  manifest — a  way  that  may  here 
be  fitly  employed. 

And  first  let  us  make  sure  of  the  meaning  wrapped  up 
in  this  expression — right  to  labour.  Evidently  if  we  would 
avoid  mistakes  we  must  render  it  literally — right  to  the 
labour ;  for  the  thing  demanded  is  not  t^e  liberty  of  la 
bouring  :  this,  no  one  disputes ;  but  it  is-  the  opportunity 
of  labouring — the  having  remunerative  employment  pro 
vided,  which  is  contended  for.  Now,  without  dwelling 
upon  the  fact  that  the  word  right  as  here  used,  bears  a 
signification  quite  different  from  its  legitimate  one — that 
it  does  not  here  imply  something  inherent  in  man,  but 


34:4:  POOE-LAWS. 

something  depending  upon  external  circumstances — not 
something  possessed  in  virtue  of  his  faculties,  but  some 
thing*  springing  out  of .  his  relationship  to  others — not 
something  true  of  him  as  a  solitary  individual,  but  some 
thing  which  can  be  true  of  him  only  as  one  of  a  commu 
nity — not  something  antecedent  to  society,  but  something 
necessarily  subsequent  to  it — not  something  expressive  of 
a  claim  to  do,  but  of  a  claim  to  be  done  imto — without 
dwelling  upon  this,  let  us  take  the  expression  as  it  stands, 
and  see  how  it  looks  when  reduced  to  its  lowest  terms. 
When  the  artisan  asserts  his  right  to  have  work  provided 
for  him,  he  presupposes  the  existence  of  some  power  on 
which  devolves  the  duty  of  providing  such  work.  What 
power  is  this  ?  The  government,  he  says.  But  the  gov 
ernment  is  not  an  original  power,  it  is  a  deputed  one — is 
subject,  therefore,  to  the  instruction  of  its  employer — must 
do  that  only  which  its  employer  directs — and  can  be  held 
responsible  for  nothing  save  the  performance  of  its  employ 
er's  behests.  Now  ^ho  is  its  employer  ?  Society.  Strictly 
speaking,  therefore,  the  assertion  of  our  artisan  is,  that  it 
is  the  duty  of  society  to  find  work  for  him.  But^he  is  him 
self  a  member  of  society — is  consequently  a  unit  of  that 
body  who  ought,  as  he  says,  to  find  work  for  every  man — 
has  hence  a  share  in  the  duty  of  finding  work  for  every 
mani"/  Whilst,  therefore^  it  is  the  duty  of  all  other  men 
to  find  work  for  him,  it  is  his  duty  to  help  in  finding  work 
for  all  other  men/  ^And  hence,  if  we  indicate  his  fellows 
alphabetically,  his  theory  is  that  A,  B,  C,  D,  and  the  rest 
of  the  nation,  are  bound  to  employ  him ;  that  he  is  bound, 
in  company  with  B,  C,  D,  and  the  rest,  to  employ  A ;  that 
he  is  bound,  in  company  with  A,  C,  D,  and  the  rest,  to 
employ  B ;  is  bound,  with  A,  B,  D,  and  the  rest,  to  em 
ploy  C,  with  A,  B,  C,  and  the  rest,  to  employ  D ;  and  so 
on  with  each  individual  of  the  half  score  or  score  millions, 
of  whom  the  society  may  be  composed ! 


THE   CLAIM   TO   EMPLOYMENT.  34:5 

Thus  do  we  see  how  readily  imaginary  rights  are  dis 
tinguishable  from  real  ones.  They  need  no  disproof:  they 
disprove  themselves.  The  ordeal  of  a  definition  "breaks 
the  illusion  at  once.  Bubble-like,  they  will  bear  a  cursory 
glance ;  but  disappear  in  the  grasp  of  any  one  who  tries 
to  lay  hold  of  them. 

Meanwhile  we  must  not  overlook  the  fact  that,  erro 
neous  as  are  these  poor-law  and  communist  theories— 
these  assertions  of  a  man's  right  to  a  maintenance,  and  of 
his  right  to  have  work  provided  for  him — they  are,  never 
theless,  nearly  related  to  a  truth.  They  are  unsuccessful 
efforts  to  express  the  fact,  that  whoso  is  born  on  this 
planet  of  ours  thereby  obtains  some  interest  in  it — may 
not  be  summarily  dismissed  again — may  not  have  his  ex 
istence  ignored  by  those  in  possession.  In  other  words, 
they  are  attempts  to  embody  that  thought  which  finds  its 
legitimate  utterance  in  the  law-^all  men  have  equal  rights 
to  the  use  of  the  Earth  (Chap.  IX.).  The  prevalence  of 
these  Crude  ideas  is  natural  enough.  A  vague  perception 
that  there  is  something  wrong  about  the  relationship  in 
which  the  great  mass  of  mankind  stand  to  the  soil  and  to 
life,  Was  sure  eventually  to  grow  up.  After  getting  from 
under  the  grosser  injustice  of  slavery,  men  could  not  help 
beginning  in  course  of  time  to  feel  what  a  monstrous 
thing  it  was  that  nine  people  out  of  ten  should  live  in  the 
world  on  sufferance,  not  having  even  standing  room,  save 
by  allowance  of  those  who  claimed  the  Earth's  surface 
(p.  131).  Could  it  be  right  that  all  these  human  beings 
should  not  only  be  without  claim  to  the  necessaries  of  life — 
should  not  only  be  denied  the  use  of  those  elements  from 
which  such  necessaries  are  obtainable — but  should  further 
be  unable  to  exchange  their  labour  for  such  necessaries, 
except  by  leave  of  their  more  fortunate  fellows  ?  Could 
it  be  that  the  majority  had  thus  no  better  title  to  exist 
ence  than  one  based  upon  the  good-will  or  convenience  of 
15* 


346  POOK-LAWS. 

the  minority  ?  Could  it  be  that  these  landless  men  had 
"  been  mis-Kent  to  this  earth,  where  all  the  seats  were  al 
ready  taken  ?  "  Surely  not.  And  if  not,  how  ought  mat 
ters  to  stand  ?  To  all  which  questions,  now  forced  upon 
men's  minds  in  more  or  less  definite  shapes,  there  come, 
amongst  other  answers,  these  theories  of  a  right  to  a  main 
tenance  and  a  right  of  labour.  Whilst,  therefore,  they 
must  be  rejected  as  untenable,  we  may  still  recognize  in 
them  the  imperfect  utterances  of  the  moral  sense  in  its 
efforts  to  express  equity. 

§  3.  The  wrong  done  to  the  people  at  large  by  rob 
bing  them  of  their  birthright — their  heritage  in  the  earth — 
is,  indeed,  thought  by  some  a  sufficient  excuse  for  a  poor- 
law,  which  is  regarded  by  such  as  an  instrumentality  for 
distributing  compensation.  There  is  much  plausibility  in 
.  this  construction  of  the  matter.  But  as  a  defence  of  na 
tional  organizations  for  the  support  of  paupers,  it  will  not 
bear  criticism.  Even  were  there  no  better  reason  for  de 
murring  to  the  supposed  compromise,  it  might  still  be  ob 
jected  that  to  counterbalance  one  injury  by  inflicting 
another,  and  to  perpetuate  these  mutual  injuries  without 
knowing  whether  they  are  or  are  not  equivalents,  is  at 
best  a  very  questionable  policy.  Why  organize  a  diseased 
state  ?  Some  time  or  other  this  morbid  constitution  of 
things,  under  which  the  greater  part  of  the  body-politic 
is  cut  off  from  direct  access  to  the  source  of  life,  must  be 
changed.  Difficult,  no  doubt,  men  will  find  it  to  establish 
a  normal  condition.  There  is  no  knowing  how  many  gen 
erations  may  pass  away  before  the  task  is  accomplished. 
But  accomplished  it  will  eventually  be.  All  arrange 
ments,  however,  which  disguise  the  evils  entailed  by  the 
present  inequitable  relationship  of  mankind  to  the  soil, 
postpone  the  day  of  rectification.  "A  generous  poor- 
law  "  is  openly  advocated  as  the  best  means  of  pacifying 


WHEKE   THE   BURDEN   FALLS.  347 

an  irritated  people.  Workhouses  are  used  to  mitigate  the 
more  acute  symptoms  of  social  unhealthiness.  Parish 
pay  is  hush-money.  Whoever,  then,  desires  the  radical 
cure  of  national  maladies,  but  especially  of  this  atrophy 
of  one  class,  and  hypertrophy  of  another,  consequent  upon 
unjust  land  tenure,  cannot  consistently  advocate  any  kind 
of  compromise. 

But  a  poor-law  is  not  the  means  of  distributing  com 
pensation.  Neither  in  respect  of  those  from  whom  it 
comes,  nor  in  respect  of  those  to  whom  it  goes,  does  pau 
per-relief  fulfil  the  assumed  purpose.  According  to  the 
hypothesis  poors'-rates  should  bear  wholly  upon  the  land. 
But  they  do  not.  And  at  least  that  part  of  them  which 
bears  upon  the  land  should  come  from  the  usurpers  or  their 
descendants.  But  it  does  not.  According  to  the  hypoth 
esis  the  burden  should  not  fall  upon  the  innocent.  But  it 
does ;  for  poors'-rates  were  imposed  after  landed  property  • 
had  in  many  cases  changed  hands  by  purchase.  Accord 
ing  to  the  hypothesis  the  burden  should  not  fall  upon 
those  already  defrauded.  But  it  does ;  for  the  majority 
of  rate-payers  belong  to  the  non-landowning  class.  Ac 
cording  to  the  hypothesis  all  men  kept  out  of  their  inher 
itance  should  receive  a  share  of  this  so-called  compensa 
tion.  But  they  do  not ;  for  only  here  and  there  one  gets 
any  of  it.  In  no  way,  therefore,  is  the  theory  carried  out. 
The  original  depredators  are  beyond  reach.  The  guiltless 
are  taxed  in  their  place.  A  large  proportion  of  those  al 
ready  robbed  are  robbed  afresh.  And  of  the  rest,  only  a 
few  receive  the  proceeds. 

§  4.  The  usual  reason  assigned  for  supporting  a 
poor-low  is,  that  it  is  an  indispensable  means  of  mitigat 
ing  popular  suffering.  Given  by  a  churchman  such  a 
reason'  is  natural  enough ;  but  coming,  as  it  often  does, 
from  a  dissenter,  it  is  strangely  inconsistent.  Most  of  the 


348  POOK-LAWS. 

objections  raised  by  the  dissenter  to  an  established  relig-^ 
ion  will  tell  with  equal  force  against  established  charity. 
He  asserts  that  it  is  unjust  to  tax  him  for  the  support  of  a 
creed  he  does  not  believe.  May  not  another  as  reasona 
bly  protest  against  being  taxed  for  the  maintenance  of  a 
system  of  relief  he  disapproves?  He  denies  the  right  of 
any  bishop  or  council  to  choose  for  him  which  doctrines 
he  shall  accept  and  which  he  shall  reject.  Why  does  he 
not  also  deny  the  right  of  any  commission  or  vestry  to 
choose  for  him  who  are  worthy  of  his  charity  and  who  are 
not  ?  If  he  dissents  from  a  national  church  on  the  ground 
that  religion  will  be  more  general  and  more  sincere  when 
voluntarily  sustained,  should  he  not  similarly  dissent  from 
a  poor-law  on  the  ground  that  spontaneous  beneficence 
will  produce  results  both  wider  and  better  ?  Might  not 
the  corruption  which  he  points  out  as  neutralizing  the  ef- 
•fects  of  a  state-taught  creed,  be  paralleled  by  those  evils 
of  pauperism  accompanying  a  state-provision  for  the  poor? 
Should  not  his  nonconformity  in  respect  to  faith  be  ac 
companied  by  nonconformity  in  respect  to  good  works? 
Certainly  his  present  opinions  are  incongruous  beyond  all 
reconciling.  He  resists  every  attempt  to  interfere  with 
the  choice  of  his  religion,  but  submits  to  despotic  dicta 
tion  as  to  the  exercise  of  that  religion.  Whilst  he  denies 
the  right  of  a  legislature  to  explain  the  theory,  he  yet  ar 
gues  the  necessity  of  its  direction  in  the  practice.  It  is 
inconceivable  that  these  positions  can  be  harmonized. 
Whoso  believes  that  spiritual  destitution  is  to  be  remedied 
only  by  a  national  church,  may  with  some  show  of  reason 
propose  to  deal  with  physical  destitution  by  an  analogous 
instrumentality.  But  the  advocate  of  voluntaryism  is 
bound  to  stand  by  his  principle  in  the  one  case  as  much 
as  in  the  other. 


5.     Whether  the  sufferings  of  the  unfortunate  shall 


THE   REACTION    OF   BENEVOLENT   ACTS.  349 

be  soothed  in  obedience  to  the  gentle  whisperings  of  be 
nevolence,  or  whether  fear  of  the  harsh  threats  of  law 
shall  be  the  motive  for  relieving  them,  is  indeed  a  ques 
tion  of  no  small  importance.  In  deciding  how  misery  is 
best  alleviated  we  have  to  consider,  not  only  what  is  done 
for  the  afflicted,  but  what  is  the  reactive  effect  upon  those 
who  do  it.  The  relationship  that  springs  up  between 
benefactor  and  beneficiary  is,  for  this  present  state  of  the 
world,  a  refining  one.  Having  power  to  muzzle  awhile 
those  propensities  of  the  savage  which  yet  linger  in  us — 
corrective  as  it  is  of  that  cold,  hard  state  of  feeling  in 
which  the  every-day  business  of  life  is  pursued — and 
drawing  closer  as  it  does  those  links  of  mutual  depend 
ence  which  keep  society  together — charity  is  in  its  nature 
essentially  civilizing.  The  emotion  accompanying  every 
generous  act  adds  an  atom  to  the  fabric  of  the  ideal  man. 
As  no  cruel  thing  can  be  done  without  character  being 
thrust  a  degree  back  toward  barbarism,  so  no  kind  thing 
can  be  done  without  character  being  moved  a  degree  for 
ward  toward  perfection.  Doubly  efficacious,  therefore, 
are  all  assuagings  of  distress  instigated  by  sympathy ;  for 
not  only  do  they  remedy  the  particular  evils  to  be  met, 
but  they  help  to  mould  humanity  into  a  form  by  which 
such  evils  will  one  day  be  precluded. 

Far  otherwise  is  it  with  law-enforced  plans  of  relief. 
These  exercise  just  the  opposite  influence.  "  The  quality 
of  mercy  (or  pity)  is  not  strained,"  says  the  poet.  But  a 
poor-law  tries  to  make  men  pitiful  by  force.  "  It  drop- 
peth  as  the  gentle  rain  from  heaven,"  continues  the  poet. 
By  a  poor-law  it  is  wrung  from  the  unwilling.  "  It  blesses 
him  that  gives,  and  him  that  takes,"  adds  the  poet.  A 
poor-law  makes  it  curse  both;  the  one  with  discontent 
and  recklessness,  the  other  with  complainings  and  often- 
renewed  bitterness. 

This  turning  of  balm  into  poison  must  have  been  re- 


350  POOR-LAWS. 

marked  by  the  most  careless.  Watch  a  rate-payer  when 
the  collector's  name  is  announced.  You  shall  observe  no 
kindling  of  the  eye  at  some  thought  of  happiness  to  be 
conferred — no  relaxing  of  the  mouth  as  though  selfish 
cares  had  for  the  moment  been  forgotten — .no  softening  of 
the  voice  to  tell  of  compassionate  emotion :  no,  none  of 
these ;  but  rather  shall  you  see  contracted  features,  a 
clouded  brow,  a  sudden  disappearance  of  what  habitual 
kindliness  of  expression  there  may  be ;  the  tax-paper  is 
glanced  over  half  in  fear  and  half  in  vexation  ;  there  are 
grumblings  about  the  short  time  that  has  elapsed  since 
the  last  rate ;  the  purse  comes  slowly  from  the  pocket ; 
every  coin  is  grudgingly  parted  with ;  and  after  the  col 
lector  (who  is  treated  with  bare  civility)  has  made  his 
exit,  some  little  time  passes  before  the  usual  equanimity 
is  regained.  Is  there  any  thing  in  this  to  remind  us  of  the 
virtue  which  is  "  twice  blessed  "  ?  Note  again  how  this 
act-of-parliament  charity  perpetually  supersedes  men's 
better  sentiments.  Here  is  a  respectable  citizen  with 
enough  and  to  spare :  a  man  of  some  feeling ;  liberal,  if 
there  is  need ;  generous  even  if  his  pity  is  excited.  A 
beggar  knocks  at  his  door ;  or  he  is  accosted  in  his  walk 
by  some  wayworn  tramp.  What  does  he  do  ?  Does  he 
listen,  investigate,  and,  if  proper,  assist  ?  ~No ;  he  com 
monly  cuts  short  the  tale  with — "  I  have  nothing  for  you, 
my  good  man ;  you  must  go  to  your  parish."  And  then 
he  shuts  the  door,  or  walks  on,  as  the  case  may  be,  with 
evident  unconcern.  Should  it  strike  him  the  next  mo 
ment  that  there  was  something  very  wo-begone  in  the  pe 
titioner's  look,  this  uncomfortable  thought  is  met  by  the 
reflection,  that  so  long  as  there  is  a  poor-laAV,  he  cannot 
starve,  and  that  it  will  be  time  enough  to  consider  his 
claims  when  he  applies  for  relief.  Thus  does  the  con 
sciousness  that  there  exists  a  legal  provision  for  the  indi 
gent,  act  as  an  opiate  to  the  yearnings  of  sympathy. 


BAD   EFJFECTS   OF   STATE   ASSISTANCE.  351 

Had  there  been  no  ready-made  excuse,  the  behaviour 
would  probably  have  been  different.  Commiseration, 
pleading  for  at  least  an  inquiry  into  the  case,  would  most 
likely  have  prevailed  ;  and,  in  place  of  an  application  to 
the  board  of  guardians,  ending  in  a  pittance  coldly  handed 
across  the  pay-table  to  be  thanklessly  received,  might' 
have  commenced  a  relationship  good  for  both  parties  —  a 
generosity  humanizing  to  the  one,  and  a  succour  made 
doubly  valuable  to  the  other  by  a  few  words  of  consola 
tion  and  encouragement,  followed,  it  may  be,  by  a  lift  into 
some  self-supporting  position. 

In  truth  there  could  hardly  be  found  a  more  efficient  .\' 
device  for  estranging  men  from  each  other,  and  decreasing 
their  fellow-feeling,  than  this  system  of  state-almsgiving. 
Being  kind  by  proxy  !  —  could  any  thing  be  more  blight 
ing  to  the  finer  instincts  ?  Here  is  an  institution  through 
which,  for  a  few  shillings  periodically  paid,  the  citizen 
may  compound  for  all  kindness  owing  from  him  to  his 
poorer  brothers.  Is  he  troubled  with  twinges  of  con 
science  ?  here  is  an  anodyne  for  him,  to  be  had  by  sub 
scribing  so  much  in  the  pound  on  his  rental.  Is  he  indif-  I 
ferent  as  to  the  welfare  of  others  ?  why  then  in  return  for 
punctual  payment  of  rates  he  shall  have  absolution  for 
hardness  of  heart.  Look;  here  is  the  advertisement. 
"  Gentlemen's  benevolence  done  for  them,  in  the  most 
business-like  manner,  and  on  the  lowest  terms.  Charity 
doled  out  by  a  patent  apparatus,  warranted  to  save  all 
soiling  of  fingers  and  offence  to  the  nose.  Good  works 
undertaken  by  contract.  Infallible  remedies  for  self-re 
proach  always,  on  hand.  Tender  feelings  kept  easy  at  pel- 


thus  we  have  the  gentle,  softening,  elevating  in 
tercourse  that  should  be  habitually  taking  place  between 
rich  and  poor,  superseded  by  a  cold,  hard,  lifeless  mechan 
ism,  bound  together  by  dry  parchment  acts  and  regula- 


352  POOK-LAWS. 

tions — managed  by  commissioners,  boards,  clerks,  and  col 
lectors,  who  perform  their  respective  functions  as  tasks — 
and  kept  a-going  by  money  forcibly  taken  from  all  classes 
indiscriminately. '  In  place  of  the  music  breathed  by  feel 
ings  attuned  to  kind  deeds,  we  have  the  harsh  creaking 
and  jarring  of  a  thing  that  cannot  stir  without  creating 
discord — a  thing  whose  every  act,  from  the  gathering  of 
its  funds  to  their  final  distribution,  is  prolific  of  grum 
blings,  discontent,  anger — a  thing  that  breeds  squabbles 
about  authority,  disputes  as  to  claims,  brow-beatings,  jeal 
ousies,  litigations,  corruption,  trickery,  lying,  ingratitude — 
a  thing  that  supplants,  and  therefore  makes  dormant,  men's 
nobler  feelings,  whilst  it  stimulates  their  baser  ones. 

And  now  mark  how  we  find  illustrated  in  detail  the 
truth  elsewhere  expressed  in  the  abstract,  that  whenever 
a  government  oversteps  its  duty — the  maintaining  of 
men's  rights — it  inevitably  retards  the  process  of  adapta 
tion.  For  what  faculty  is  it  whose  work  a  poor-law  so  of 
ficiously  undertakes  ?  Sympathy.  The  very  faculty  above 
all  others  needing  to  be  exercised.  The  faculty  which 
distinguishes  the  social  man  from  the  savage.  The  faculty 
which  originates  the  idea  of  justice — Avhich  makes  men 
regardful  of  each  other's  claims — which  renders  society 
possible.  The  faculty  of  whose  growth  civilization  is  a 
history — on  whose  increased  strength  the  future  ameliora 
tions  of  man's  state  mainly  depend — and  by  whose  ulti 
mate  supremacy,  human  morality,  freedom,  and  happiness 
will  be  secured.  Of  this  faculty  poor-laws  partially  sup 
ply  the  place.  By  doing  which  they  dimmish  the  demands 
made  upon  it,  limit  its  exercise,  check  its  development, 
and  therefore  retard  the  process  of  adaptation. 

§  6.  Pervading  all  nature  we  may  see  at  work  a 
stern  discipline,  which  is  a  little  cruel  that  it  may  be  very 
kind.  That  state  of  universal  warfare  maintained  through- 


. 

THE   MERCY   OF   SEVEEITY.  353 

out  the  lower  creation,  to  the  great  perplexity  of  many 
worthy  people,  is  at  bottom  the  most  merciful  provision 
which  the  circumstances  admit  of.  It  is  much  better  that 
the  ruminant  animal,  when  deprived  by  age  of  the  vigour 
which  made  its  existence  a  pleasure,  should  be  killed  by 
some  beast  of  prey,  than  that  it  should  linger  out  a  life 
made  painful  by  infirmities,  and  eventually  die  of  starva 
tion.  By  the  destruction  of  all  such,  not  only  is  exist 
ence  ended  before  it  becomes  burdensome,  but  room  is 
made  for  a  younger  generation  capable  of  the  fullest  en 
joyment  ;  and,  moreover,  out  of  the  very  act  of  substitu 
tion  happiness  is  derived  for  a  tribe  of  predatory  crea 
tures. /'Note  further,  that  their  carnivorous  enemies  not 
only  remove  from  herbivorous  herds  individuals  past  their 
prime,  but  also  weed  out  the  sickly,  the  malformed,  and 
the  least  fleet  or  powerful.  By  the  aid  of  which  purify 
ing  process,  as  well  as  by  the  fighting,  so  universal  in  the 
pairing  season,  all  vitiation  of  the  race  through  the  multi 
plication  of  its  inferior  samples  is  prevented;  and  the 
maintenance  of  a  constitution  completely  adapted  to  sur 
rounding  conditions,  and  therefore  most  productive  of  hap 
piness,  is  ensured. 

_  The  development  of  the  higher  creation  is  a  progress 
toward  a  form  of  being  capable  of  a  happiness  imclimin- 
ished  by  these  drawbacks.  It  is  in  the  human  race  that 
the  consummation  is  to  be  accomplished.  Civilization  is  / 
the  last  stage  of  its  accomplishment.  And  the  ideal  man 
is  the  man  in  whom  all  the  conditions  of  that  accomplish 
ment  are  fulfilled.  Meanwhile  the  well-being  of  existing 
humanity,  and  the  unfolding  of  it  into  this  ultimate  per 
fection,  are  both  secured  by  that  same  beneficent,  though 
severe  discipline,  to  which  the  animate  creation  at  large 
is  subject :  a  discipline  which  is  pitiless  in  the  working  out 
of  good :  a  felicity-pursuing  law  which  never  swerves  for 
the  avoidance  of  partial  and  temporary  suffering.  ,  The 


354:  POOE-LAWS. 

poverty  of  the  incapable,  the  distresses  that  come  upon 
the  imprudent,  the  starvation  of  the  idle,  and  those  shoul- 
derings  aside  of  the  weak  by  the  stjong,  which  leave  so 
many  "  in  shallows  and  in  miseries,"  are  the  decrees  of  a 
large,  far-seeing  benevolence.  It  seems  hard  that  an  un- 
skilfulness  which  with  all  his  efforts  he  cannot  overcome, 
should  entail  hunger  upon  the  artisan.  It  seems  hard  that 
a  labourer  incapacitated  by  sickness  from  competing  with 
his  stronger  fellows,  should  have  to  bear  the  resulting  pri 
vations.  It  seems  hard  that  widows  and  orphans  should 
be  left  to  struggle  for  life  or  death.  Nevertheless,  when 
regarded  not  separately,  but  in  connection  with  the  inter 
ests  of  universal  humanity,  these  harsh  fatalities  are  seen 
to  be  full  of  the  highest  beneficence — the  same  beneficence 
which  brings  to  early  graves  the  children  of  diseased  par 
ents,  and  singles  out  the  low-spirited,  the  intemperate, 
and  the  debilitated  as  the  victims  of  an  epidemic. 

There  are  many  very  amiable  people — people  over 
whom  in  so  far  as  their  feelings  are  concerned  we  may 
fitly  rejoice — who i have  not  the  nerve  to  look  this  matter 
fairly  in  the  face./  Disabled  as  they  are  by  their  sympa 
thies  with  present  suffering,  from  duly  regarding  ultimate 
consequences,  they  pursue  a  course  which  is  very  injudi 
cious,  and  in  the  end  even  cruel.  We  do  not  consider  it 
true  kindness  in  a  mother  to  gratify  her  child  with  sweet 
meats  that  are  certain  to  make  it  ill.  We  should  think  it 
a  very  foolish  sort  of  benevolence  which  led  a  surgeon  to 
let  his  patient's  disease  progress  to  a  fatal  issue,  rather 
than  inflict  pain  by  an  operation.  Similarly,  we  must  call 
those  spurious  philanthropists,  who,  to  prevent  present 
misery,  would  entail  greater  misery  upon  future  genera 
tions.  All  defenders  of  a  poor-law  must,  however,  be 
classed  amongst  such.  That  rigorous  necessity  which, 
when  allowed  to  act  on  them,  becomes  so  sharp  a  spur  to 
the  lazy,  and  so  strong  a  bridle  to  the  random,  these  pau- 


JUSTICE   AGGRAVATES   THE   EVIL.  355 

pers'  friends  would  repeal,  because  of  the  wailings  it  here 
and  there  produces.  Blind  to  the  fact,  that  under  the 
natural  order  of  things  society  is  constantly  excreting  its 
unhealthy,  imbecile,  slow,  vacillating,  faithless  members, 
these  unthinking,  though  well-meaning,  men  advocate  an 
interference  which  not  only  stops  the  purifying  process, 
but  even  increases  the  vitiation — absolutely  encourages 
the  multiplication  of  the  reckless  and  incompetent  by 
offering  them  an  unfailing  provision,  and  discourages  the 
multiplication  of  the  competent  and  provident  by  height 
ening  the  prospective  difficulty  of  maintaining  a  family. 
And  thus,  in  their  eagerness  to  prevent  the  really  salutary 
sufferings  that  surround  us,  these  sigh-wise  and  groan- 
foolish  people  bequeath  to  posterity  a  continually  increas 
ing  curse. 

Returning  again  to  the  highest  point  of  view,  we  find 
that  there  is  a  second  and  still  more  injurious  mode  in 
which  law-enforced  charity  checks  the  process  of  adapta 
tion.  To  become  fit  for  the  social  state,  man  has  not  only 
to  lose  his  savagencss,  but  he  has  to  acquire  the  capacities 
needful  for  civilized  life.  Power  of  application  must  be 
developed;  such  modification  of  the  intellect  as  shall 
qualify  it  for  its  new  tasks  must  take  place ;  and,  above 
all,  there  must  be  gained  the  ability  to  sacrifice  a  small 
immediate  gratification  for  a  future  great  one.  The  state 
of  transition  will  of  course  be  an  unhappy  state.  Misery 
inevitably  results  from  incongruity  between  constitution 
and  conditions.  All  these  evils,  which  afflict  us,  and  seem 
to  the  uninitiated  the  obvious  consequences  of  this  or  that 
removable  cause,  are  unavoidable  attendants  on  the  adap 
tation  now  in  progress.  Humanity  is  being  pressed 
against  the  inexorable  necessities  of  its  new  position — is 
being  moulded  into  harmony  with  them,  and  has  to  bear 
the  resulting  unhappiness  as  best  it  can.  The  process 
must  be  undergone,  and  the  sufferings  must  be  endured. 


356  POOR-LAWS. 

No  power  on  earth,  no  cunningly-devised  laws  of  states 
men,  no  world-rectifying  schemes  of  the  humane,  no  com 
munist  panaceas,  no  reforms  that  men  ever  did  broach  or 
ever  will  broach,  can  diminish  them  one  jot.  Intensified 
they  may  be,  and  are ;  and  in  preventing  their  intensifica 
tion,  the  philanthropic  will  find  ample  scope  for  exertion. 
But  there  is  bound  up  with  the  change  a  normal  amount 
of  suffering,  which  cannot  be  lessened  without  altering 
the  very  laws  of  life.  Every  attempt  at  mitigation  of  this 
eventuates  in  exacerbation  of  it.  All  that  a  poor-law,  or 
any  kindred  institution  can  do,  is  to  partially  suspend  the 
transition — to  take  off  for  awhile,  from  certain  members 
of  society,  the  painful  pressure  which  is  effecting  their 
transformation.  At  best  this  is  merely  to  postpone  what 
must  ultimately  be  borne.  But  it  is  more  than  this  :  it  is 
to  undo  what  has  already  been  done.  For  the  circum 
stances  to  which  adaptation  is  taking  place  cannot  be 
superseded  without  causing  a  retrogression — a  partial 
loss  of  the  adaptation  previously  effected;  and  as  the 
whole  process  must  some  time  or  other  be  passed 
through,  the  lost  ground  must  be  gone  over  again,  and 
the  attendant  pain  borne  afresh.  Thus,  besides  retarding 
adaptation,  a  poor-law  adds  to  the  distresses  inevitably 
attending  it. 

At  first  sight  these  considerations  seem  conclusive 
against  all  relief  to  the  poor — voluntary  as  well  as  com 
pulsory  ;  and  it  is  no  doubt  true  that  they  imply  a  con 
demnation  of  whatever  private  charity  enables  the  recipi 
ents  to  elude  the  necessities  of  our  social  existence.  With 
this  condemnation,  however,  no  rational  man  will  quarrel. 
That  careless  squandering  of  pence  which  has  fostered 
into  perfection  a  system  of  organized  begging — which  has 
made  skilful  mendicancy  more  profitable  than-  ordinary 
manual  labour — which  induces  the  simulation  of  palsy, 
epilepsy,  cholera,  and  no  end  of  diseases  and  deformities — 


EVILS   OF   INDISCRIMINATE   BELIEF.  357 

which  has  called  into  existence  warehouses  for  the  sale 
and  hire  of  impostor's  dresses — which  has  given  to  pity- 
inspiring  babes  a  market  value  of  9d.  per  day — the  un 
thinking  benevolence  which  has  generated  all  this,  cannot 
but  be  disapproved  by  every  one.  Now  it  is  only  against 
this  injudicious  charity  that  the  foregoing  argument  tells. 
To  that  charity  which  may  be  described  as  helping  men 
to  help  themselves,  it  makes  no  objection — countenances 
it  rather.  And  in  helping  men  to  help  themselves,  there 
remains  abundant  scope  for  the  exercise  of  a  people's 
sympathies.  Accidents  will  still  supply  victims  on  whom 
generosity  may  be  legitimately  expended.  Men  thrown 
upon  their  backs  by  unforeseen  events,  men  who  have 
failed  for  want  of  knowledge  inaccessible  to  them,  men 
ruined  by  the  dishonesty  of  others,  and  men  in  whom 
hope  long  delayed  has  made  the  heart  sick,  may,  with 
advantage  to  all  parties,  be  assisted.  Even  the  prodigal, 
after  severe  hardship  has  branded  his  memory  with  the 
unbending  conditions  of  social  life  to  which  he  must 
submit,  may  properly  have  another  trial  afforded  him. 
And,  although  by  these  ameliorations  the  process  of  adap 
tation  must  be  remotely  interfered  with,  yet  in  the  major 
ity  of  cases,  it  will  not  be  so  much  retarded  in  one  direc 
tion  as  it  will  be  advanced  in  another. 

§  7.  Objectionable  as  we  find  a  poor-law  to  be, 
even  under  the  supposition  that  it  does  what  it  is  intended 
to  do — diminish  present  suffering — how  shall  we  regard  it 
on  finding  that  in  reality  it  does  no  such  thing — cannot 
do  any  such  thing  ?  Yet,  paradoxical  as  the  assertion 
looks,  this  is  absolutely  the  fact.  Let  but  the  observer 
cease  to  contemplate  so  fixedly  one  side  of  the  phenome 
non — pauperism  and  its  relief,  and  begin  to  examine  the 
other  side — rates  and  the  ultimate  contributors  of  them, 
and  he  will  discover  that  to  suppose  the  sum-total  of  dis- 


358  POOR-LAWS. 

tress  diminishable  by  act-of-parliament  bounty  is  a  delu 
sion.  A  statement  of  the  case  in  terms  of  labour  and  pro 
duce  will  quickly  make  this^clear. 

Here,  at  any  specified  period,  is  a  given  quantity  of 
food  and  things  exchangable  for  food,  in  the  hands  or  at 
the  command  of  the  middle  and  upper  classes.  A  certain 
portion  of  this  food  is  needed  by  these  classes  themselves, 
and  is  consumed  by  them  at  the  same  rate,  or  very  near  it, 
be  there  scarcity  or  abundance.  Whatever  variation 
occurs  in  the  sum-total  of  food  and  its  equivalents  must 
therefore  affect  the  remaining  portion,  not  used  by  these 
classes  for  personal  sustenance.  This  remaining  portion  is 
given  by  them  to  the  people  in  return  for  their  labour, 
which  is  partly  expended  in  the  production  of  a  further 
supply  of  necessaries,  and  partly  in  the  production  of  lux 
uries.  Hence,  by  how  much  this  portion  is  deficient,  by 
so  much  must  the  people  come  short.  Manifestly  a  re 
distribution  by  legislative  or  other  agency  cannot  make 
that  sufficient  for  them  which  was  previously  insufficient. 
It  can  do  nothing  but  change  the  parties  by  whom  the 
insufficiency  is  felt.  If  it  gives  enough  to  some  who 
else  would  not  have  enough,  it  must  inevitably  reduce 
certain  others  to  the  condition  of  not  having  enough. 
And  thus,  to  the  extent  that  a  poor-law  mitigates  dis 
tress  in  one  place,  it  unavoidably  produces  distress  in 
another. 

Should  there  be  any  to  whom  this  abstract  reasoning 
is  unsatisfactory,  a  concrete  statement  of  the  case  will, 
perhaps,  remove  their  doubts.  A  poors'-rate  collector 
takes  from  the  citizen  a  sum  of  money  equivalent  to  bread 
and  clothing  for  one  or  more  paupers.  Had  not  this  sum 
been  so  taken,  it  would  either  have  been  used  to  purchase 
superfluities,  which  the  citizen  now  does  without,  or  it 
would  have  been  paid  by  him  into  a  bank,  and  lent  by 
the  banker  to  a  manufacturer,  merchant,  or  tradesman ; 


AGGRAVATES   INSTEAD   OF  BELIEVING.  359 

that  is,  it  would  ultimately  have  been  given  in  wages 
either  to  the  producer  of  the  superfluities  or  to  an  opera 
tive,  paid  out  of  the  banker's  loan.  But  this  sum  having 
been  carried  off  as  poors'-rate,  whoever  would  have  re 
ceived  it  as  wages  must  now  to  that  extent  go  without 
wages.  The  food  which  it  represented  having  been  taken 
to  sustain  a  pauper,  the  artisan  to  whom  that  food  would 
have  been  given  in  return  for  work  done,  must  now  lack 
food.  And  thus,  as  at  first  said,  the  transaction  is  simply 
a  change  of  the  parties  by  whom  the  insufficiency  of  food 
is  felt. 

Nay,  the  case  is  even  worse.  Already  it  has  been 
pointed  out,  that  by  suspending  the  process  of  adaptation, 
a  poor-law  increases  the  distress  to  be  borne  at  some 
future  day ;  and  here  we  shall  find  that  it  also  increases 
the  distress  to  be  borne  now.  For  be  it  remembered, 
that  of  the  sum  taken  in  any  year  to  support  paupers,  a 
large  portion  would  otherwise  have  gone  to  support 
labourers  employed  in  new  reproductive  works — land- 
drainage,  machine-building,  &c.  An  additional  stock  of 
commodities  would  by-and-by  have  been  produced,  and 
the  number  of  those  who  go  short  would  consequently 
have  been  diminished.  Thus  the  astonishment  expressed 
by  some  that  so  much  misery  should  exist,  notwithstand 
ing  the  distribution  of  fifteen  millions  a  year  by  endowed 
charities,  benevolent  societies,  and  poor-law  unions,  is 
quite  uncalled  for ;  seeing  that  the  larger  the  sum  gratui 
tously  administered,  the  more  intense  will  shortly  become 
the  suffering.  Manifestly,  out  of  a  given  population,  the 
greater  the  number  living  on  the  bounty  of  others,  the 
smaller  must  be  the  number  living  by  labour;  and  the 
smaller  the  number  living  by  labour,  the  smaller  must  be 
the  production  of  food  and  other  necessaries;  and  the 
smaller  the  production  of  necessaries,  the  greater  must  be 
the  distress. 


360  NATIONAL    EDUCATION. 

§  8.  We  find,  then,  that  the  verdict  given  by  the  law 
of  state-duty  against  a  public  provision  for  the  indigent  is 
enforced  by  sundry  independent  considerations.  A  criti 
cal  analysis  of  the  alleged  rights,  for  upholding  which  a 
poor-law  is  defended,  shows  them  to  be  fictitious.  Nor 
does  the  plea  that  a  poor-law  is  a  means  of  distributing 
compensation  for  wrongs  done  to  the  disinherited  people 
turn  out  to  be  valid.  The  assumption  that  only  by  law- 
administered  relief  can  physical  destitution  be  met,  proves 
to  be  quite  analogous  to  the  assumption  that  spiritual  des 
titution  necessitates  a  law-administered  religion ;  and  con 
sistency  requires  those  who  assert  the  sufficiency  of  volun 
tary  effort  in  the  one  case  to  assert  it  in  the  other  also.  The 
substitution  of  a  mechanical  charity  for  charity  prompted 
by  the  heart  is  manifestly  unfavourable  to  the  growth 
of  men's  sympathies,  and  therefore  adverse  to  the  process 
of  adaptation.  Legal  bounty  further  retards  adaptation 
by  interposing  between  the  people  and  the  conditions  to 
which  they  must  become  adapted,  so  as  partially  to  suspend 
those  conditions.  And,  to  crown  all,  we  find,  not.  only  that 
a  poor-law  must  necessarily  fail  to  diminish  popular  suffer 
ing,  but  that  it  must  inevitably  increase  that  suffering, 
both  directly  by  checking  the  production  of  commodities, 
and  indirectly  by  causing  a  retrogression  of  character, 
which  painful  discipline  must  at  some  future  day  make 
good. 


CHAPTER    XXYI. 

NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

§  1.  In  the  same  way  that  our  definition  of  state- 
duty  forbids  the  state  to  administer  religion  or  charity,  so 
likewise  does  it  forbid  the  state  to  administer  education. 


THE   STATE    HAS   NO   EIGHT   TO    EDUCATE.  361 

^Inasmuch  as  the  taking  away,  by  government,  of  more  of  a 
man's  property  than  is  needful  for  maintaining  his  rights, 
is  an  infringement  of  his  rights,  and  therefore  a  reversal 
of  the  government's  function  toward  him ;  and  inasmuch 
as  the  taking  away  of  his  property  to  educate  his  own  or 
other  people's  children  is  not  needful  for  the  maintaining 
of  his  rights ;  the  taking  away  of  his  property  for  such  a 
purpose  is  wrong.  ' 

Should  it  be  said  that  the  rights  of  the  children  are  in 
volved,  and  that  state-interposition  is  required  to  main 
tain  these,  the  reply  is  that  no  cause  for  such  interposition 
can  be  shown  until  the  children's  rights  have  been  violated, 
and  that  their  rights  are  not  violated  by  a  neglect  of  their 
education.  For,  as  repeatedly  explained,  what  we  call 
rights  are  merely  arbitrary  subdivisions,  of  the  general 
liberty  to  exercise  the  faculties ; '  and  that  only  can  be 
called  an  infringement  of  rights  which  actually  diminishes 
this  liberty — cuts  off  a  previously  existing  power  to  pur 
sue  the  objects  of  desire.  Now  the  parent  who  is  careless 
of  a  child's  education  does  not  do  this.  The  liberty  to 
exercise  the  faculties  is  left  intact.  Omitting  instruction 
in  no  way  takes  from  a  child's  freedom  to  do  whatsoever 
it  wills  in  the  best  way  it  can ;  and  this  freedom  is  all 
that  equity  demands.'*  Every  aggression,  be  it  remem 
bered — every  infraction  of  rights,  is  necessarily  active ; 
whilst  every  neglect,  carelessness,  omission,  is  as  necessa 
rily  passive.  Consequently,  however  wrong  the  non-per 
formance  of  a  parental  duty  may  be — however  much  it  is 
condemned  by  that  secondary  morality — the  morality  of 
beneficence  (pp.  83  and  84) — it  does  not  amount  to  a 
breach  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  and  cannot  therefore 
be  taken  cognizance  of  by  the  state. 

§   2.      Were  there  no  direct  disproof  of  the  frequently 
alleged  right  to  education  at  the  hands  of  the  state,  the 
16 


362  NATIONAL    EDUCATION. 

absurdities  in  which  it  entangles  its  assertors  would  suffi 
ciently  show  its  invalidity.  Conceding  for  a  moment  that 
the  government  isQjound  to  educate  a  man's  children, 
then,  what  kind  of  logic  will  demonstrate  that  it  is  not 
bound  to  feed  and  clothe  them  ?  If  there  should  be  an 
act-of-parliament  provision  for  the  development  of  their 
minds,  why  should  there  not  be  an  act-of-parliament  pro 
vision  for  the  development  of  their  bodies  ?  If  the  men 
tal  wants  of  the  rising  generation  ought  to  be  satisfied  by 
the  state,  why  not  their  physical  ones  ?  The  reasoning 
which  is  held  to  establish  the  right  to  intellectual  food, 
will  equally  well  establish  the  right  to  material  food :  nay, 
will  do  more — will  prove  that  children  should  be  alto 
gether  cared  for  by  government.  For  if  the  benefit,  im 
portance,  or  necessity  of  education  be  assigned  as  a  suffi 
cient  reason  why  government  should  educate,  then  may 
the  benefit,  importance,  or  necessity  of  food,  clothing, 
shelter,  and  warmth  be  assigned  as  a  sufficient  reason  why 
government  should  administer  these  also.  So  that  the  al 
leged  right  cannot  be  established  without  annulling  all 
parental  responsibility  whatever.  ^ 

Should  further  refutation  be  thought  needful,  there  is 
the  ordeal  of  a  definition.  We  lately  found  this  ordeal 
.fatal  to  the  assumed  right  to  a  maintenance ;  we  shall  find 
it  equally  fatal  to  this  assumed  right  to  education.  For 
what  is  an  education  ?  Where,  between  the  teaching  of  a 
dame-school,  and  the  most  comprehensive  university  cur 
riculum,  can  be  drawn  the  line  separating  that  portion  of 
mental  culture  Avhich  may  be  justly  claimed  of  the  state, 
from  that  which  may  not  be  so  claimed  ?  What  peculiar 
quality  is  there  in  reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic,  which 
gives  the  embryo  citizen  a  right  to  have  them  imparted  to 
him,  but  which  quality  is  not  shared  in  by  geography,  and 
history,  and  drawing,  and  the  natural  sciences  ?  Must 
calculation  be  taught  because  it  is  useful  ?  why  so  is  ge- 


WHAT   PRINCIPLE   SHALL   GUIDE   IT  ?  363 

ometry,  as  the  carpenter  and  mason  will  tell  us;  so  is 
chemistry,  as  we  may  gather  from  dyers  and  bleachers ; 
so  is  physiology,  as  is  abundantly  proved  by  the  ill-health 
written  in  so  many  faces.  Astronomy,  mechanics,  geol 
ogy,  and  the  various  connate  sciences — should  not  these 
be  taught,  too  ?  they  are  all  useful.  Where  is  the  unit  of 
measure  by  which  we  may  determine  the  respective  val 
ues  of  different  kinds  of  knowledge  ?  7-Or,  assuming  them 
determined,  how  can  it  be  shown  that  a  child  may  claim 
from  the  civil  power  knowledge  of  such  and  such  values, 
but  not  knowledge  of  certain  less  values  ?  When  those 
who  demand  a  state-education  can  say  exactly  how  much 
is  due — can  agree  upon  what  the  young  have  a  right  to, 
and  what  not — it  will  be  time  to  listen.  But  until  they 
accomplish  this  impossibility,  their  plea  cannot  be  enter 
tained. 

§3.  A  sad  snare  would  these  advocates  of  legisla 
tive  teaching  betray  themselves  into,  could  they  substan 
tiate  their  doctrine.  For  what  is  meant  by  saying  that  a 
government  ought  to  educate  the  people?  why  should 
they  be  educated  ?.  what  is  the  education  for  ?  Clearly  to 
fit  the  people  for  social  life — to  make  them  good  citizens. 
And  who  is  to  say  what  are  good  citizens  ?  The  govern 
ment  :  there  is  no  other  judge.  And  who  is  to  say  how 
these  good  citizens  may  be  made  ?  The  government : 
there  is  no  other  judge.  Hence  the  proposition  is  convert 
ible  into  this-/-a  government  ought  to  mould  children  into 
good  citizens,  using  its  own  discretion  in  settling  what  a 
good  citizen  is,  and  how  the  child  may  be  moulded  into 
one.  -^t  must  first  form  for  itself  a  definite  conception  of 
a  pattern  citizen ;  ftnd  having  done  this,  must  elaborate 
such  system  of  discipline  as  seems  best  calculated  to  pro 
duce  citizens  after  that  pattern.  This  system  of  discipline 
it  is  bound  to  enforce  to  the  uttermost.  For  if  it  does 


364:  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

otherwise,  it  allows  men  to  become  different  from  what  in 
its  judgment  they  should  become,  and  therefore  fails  in 
that  duty  it  is  charged  to  fulfil.  Being  thus  justified  in 
carrying  out  rigidly  such  plans  as  it  thinks  best,  every 
government  ought  to  do  what  the  despotic  governments 
of  the  Continent  and  of  China  do.  That  regulation  under 
which,  in  France,  "  private  schools  cannot  be  established 
without  a  license  from  the  minister,  and  can  be  shut  up  by 
a  simple  ministerial  order,"  is  a  step  in  the  right  direction, 
but  does  not  go  far  enough ;  seeing  that  the  state  cannot 
permit  its  mission  to  be  undertaken  by  others,  without 
endangering  the  due  performance  of  it.  The  forbidding 
of  all  private  schools  whatever,  as  until  recently  in  Prus 
sia,  is  nearer  the  mark.  Austrian  legislation,  too,  realizes 
with  some  consistency  the  state-education  theory.  By  it 
a  tolerably  stringent  control  over  the  mental  culture  of 
the  nation  is  exercised.  Much  thinking  being  held  at  va 
riance  with  good  citizenship,  the  teaching  of  metaphysics, 
political  economy,  and  the  like,  is  discouraged.  Some  sci 
entific  works  are  prohibited.  And  a  reward  is  offered  for 
the  apprehension  of  those  who  circulate  Bibles — the  au 
thorities  in  the  discharge  of  their  function  preferring  to 
entrust  the  interpretation  of  that  book  to  their  employes 
the  Jesuits.  But  in  China  alone  is  the  idea  carried  out 
with  logical  completeness.  /There  the  government  pub 
lishes  a  list  of  works  which  may  be  read ;  and  considering 
obedience  the  supreme^  virtue,  authorizes  such  only  as  are 
friendly  to  despotism./'  Fearing  the  unsettling  effects  of 
innovation,  it  allows  nothing  to  be  taught  but  what  pro 
ceeds  from  itself.  To  the  end  of  producing  pattern  citi 
zens  it  exerts  a  stringent  discipline  over  all  conduct. 
\There  are  "  rules  for  sitting,  standing,  walking,  talking, 
and  bowing,  laid  down  with  the  greatest  precision.  Schol 
ars  are  prohibited  from  chess,  football,  flying  kites,  shuttle 
cock,  playing  on  wind  instruments,  training  beasts,  birds, 


ITS    SELFISH    PURPOSES.  365 

fishes,  or  insects — all  which  amusements,  it  is  said,  dissi 
pate  the  mind  and  debase  the  heart."    / 

NOT/ a  minute  dictation/  like  thia$  which  extends  to 
every  action,  and  will  brook  no  nay,  istlie  legitimate  real 
ization  of  this  state-education  theory.  "~^hether  the  gov 
ernment  has  got  erroneous  conceptions  of  what  citizens 
ought  to  be,  or  whether  the  methods  of  training  it  adopts 
are  injudicious,  is  not  the  question.  According  to  the  hy 
pothesis  it  is  commissioned  to  discharge  a  specified  func 
tion.  It  finds  no  ready-prescribed  way  of  doing  this.  It 
has  no  alternative,  therefore,  but  to  choose  that  way  which 
seems  to  it  most  fit.  And  as  there  exists  no  higher  au 
thority,  either  to  dispute  or  confirm  its  judgment,  it  is  jus 
tified  in  the  absolute  enforcement  of  its  plans,  be  they 
what  they  may.  ~7As  from  the  proposition  that  government 
ought  to  teach  religion,  there  springs  the  other  proposi 
tion,  that  government  must  decide  what  is  religious  truth, 
and  how  it  is  to  be  taught ;  so,  trie  assertion  that  govern 
ment  ought  to  educate,  necessitates  the  further  assertion 
that  it  must  say  what  eduication  is,  and  how  it  shall  be 
conducted.  ^And  the  same  rigid  popery,  which  we  found 
to  be  a  logical  consequence  in  the  one  case  (p.  337),  fol 
lows  in  the  other  also. 

§  4.  There  are  few  sayings  more  trite  than  this, 
that  love  of  offspring  is  one  of  our  most  powerful  pas 
sions.  To  become  a  parent  is  an  almost  universal  wish. 
The  intensity  of  affection  exhibited  in  the  glistening  eye, 
the  warm  kiss,  and  the  fondling  caress — in  the  untiring 
patience,  and  the  ever  ready  alarm  of  the  mother,  is  a 
theme  on  which  philosophers  have  written  and  poets  have 
sung  in  all  ages.  Every  one  has  remarked  how  commonly 
the  feeling  overmasters  all  others.  Observe  the  self-grat- 
ulation  with  which  maternity  witnesses  her  first-born's 
unparalleled  achievements.  Mark  the  pride  with  which 


366  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

the  performances  of  each  little  brat  are  exhibited  to  every 
visitor  as  indicating  a  precocious  genius.  Consider  again 
the  deep  interest  which  in  later  days  a  father  feels  in  his 
children's  mental  welfare,  and  the  anxiety  he  manifests  to 
get  them  on  in  life;  the  promptings  of  his  natural. affec 
tion  being  ofttimes  sharpened  by  the  reflection  that  the 
comfort  of  his  old  age  may,  perchance,  be  dependent  upon 
their  success. 

Now  "  servants  and  interpreters  of  nature "  have 
usually  supposed  these  feelings  to  be  of  some  use.  Hith 
erto  they  have  always  thought  that  the  gratification  accru 
ing  to  a  mother  from  the  forwardness  of  her  little  ones 
serves  as  a  stimulus  to  the  proper  culture  of  their  minds — 
that  the  honour  which  the  father  expects  to  derive  from 
the  distinction  of  his  sons  acts  as  an  incentive  to  their 
improvement — and  that  the  anticipation  by  parents  of  the 
distress  which  ill-trained  children  may  one  day  entail  con 
stitutes  an  additional  spur  to  the  proper  management  of 
them.  In  these  strong  affections  and  mutual  dependencies 
observers  believed  they  saw  an  admirably-arranged  chain 
of  influences,  calculated  to  secure  the  mental  and  physical 
development  of  successive  generations ;  and  in  the  simpli 
city  of  their  faith  had  concluded  that  these  divinely-ap 
pointed  means  were  fully  sufficient  for  this  purpose."-- It 
would  appear,  however,  according  to  the  state-education 
ists,  that  they  have  been  mistaken.  It  seems  that  this 
apparatus  of  feelings  is  wholly  insufficient  to  work  out 
the  desideratum — that  this  combination  of  affections  and 
interests  was  not  provided  for  such  a  purpose,  or,  what  is 
the  same  thing,  that  it  has  no  purpose  at  all.  And  so,  in 
default  of  any  natural  provision  for  supplying  the  exi 
gency,  legislators  exhibit  to  us  the  design  and  specifica 
tion  of  a  state-machine,  made  up  of  masters,  ushers,  in 
spectors,  and  councils,  to  be  worked  by  a  due  proportion 
of  taxes,  and  to  be  plentifully  supplied  with  raw  material, 


OF  TH 

TEH 

grind  a  population  of  well-trained  men  and  women,  who 
shall  be  "  useful  members  of  the  community  " ! 

§  5.  But  it  is  argued  that  parents,  and  especially 
those  whose  children  most  need  instructing,  do  not  know 
what  good  instruction  is.  "  In  the  matter  of  education," 
says  Mr.  Mill,  "  the  intervention  of  government  is  justi 
fiable  ;  because  the  case  is  one  in  which  the  interest  and 
judgment  of  the  consumer  are  not  sufficient  security  for 
the  goodness  of  the  commodity." 

It  is  strange  that  so  judicious  a  writer  should  feel  sat 
isfied  with  such  a  worn-out  excuse.  This  -alleged  incom- 
petency  on  the  part  of  the  people  has  been  the  reason  as 
signed  for  all  state-interferences  whatever.  It  was  on  the 
plea  that  buyers  were  unable  to  tell  good  fabrics  from 
bad,  that  those  complicated  regulations  which  encumbered 
the  French  manufacturers  were  established.  The  use  of 
certain  dyes  here  in  England  was  prohibited,  because  of 
the  insufficient  discernment  of  the  people.  Directions  for 
the  proper  making  of  pins  were  issued,  under  the  idea 
that  experience  would  not  teach  the  purchasers  which 
were  best.  <  Those  examinations  as  to  competency  which 
the  German  handicraftsmeli  undergo,  are  held  needful,  as 
safeguards  to  the  consumers.  A  stock  argument  for  the 
state-teaching  of  religion  has  been  that  the  masses  cannot 

O  O 

distinguish  false  religion  from  true.  There  is  hardly  a 
single  department  of  life  over  which,  for  similar  reasons, 
legislative  supervision  has  not  been,  or  may  not  be,  estab 
lished.  Here  is  Mr.  H.  Hodson  Rugg,  M.R.C.S.,  publish 
ing  a  pamphlet  to  point  out  the  injury  inflicted  upon  poor 
ignorant  householders  by  the  adulteration  of  milk,  and 
proposing  as  a  remedy  that  there  shall  be  government  of 
ficers  to  test  the  milk,  and  to  confiscate  it  when  not  good — 
police  to  inspect  the  ventilation  of  cow-sheds,  and  to  order 


3G8  NATIONAL    EDUCATION. 

away  invalid  cattle — .and  a  government  cow-infirmary, 
with  veterinary  surgeon  attached.  >  To-morrow  some  one 
else  may  start  up  to  tell  us  that  bad  bread  is  still  more 
injurious  than  bad  milk,  equally  common,  quite  as  difficult 
to  distinguish,  and  that,  consequently,  bakehouses  ought 
to  be  overlooked  by  the  authorities.  Next  there  will  be 
wanted  officials  with  hydrometers  and  chemical  reagents, 
to  dabble  in  the  vats  of  the  porter-breweries.  In  the- 
wake  of  these  must,  of  course,  follow  others,  commissioned 
to  watch  the  doings  of  wine  merchants.  And  so  on,  un 
til,  in  the  desire  to  have  all  processes  of  production  duly 
inspected,  we  approach  a  condition  somewhat  like  that 
of  the  slave  states,  in  which,  as  they  say,  "  one-half  of  the 
community  is  occupied  in  seeing  that  the  other  half  does 
its  duty."  And  for  each  additional  interference  the  plea 
may  toe,  as  it  always  has  been,  that  "  the  interest  and 
judgment  of  the  consumer  are  not  sufficient  security  for 
the  goodness  of  the  commodity." 

Should  it  be  said  that  the  propriety  of  legislative  con 
trol  depends  upon  circumstances;  that  respecting  some 
articles  the  judgment  of  the  consumer  is  sufficient,  whilst 
respecting  other  articles  it  is  not ;  and  that  the  difficulty 
of  deciding  upon  its  quality,  places  education-  amongst 
these  last ;  the  reply  again  is,  tnat  the  same  has  been  said 
on  behalf  of  all  meddlings  in  turn.  Plenty  of  trickeries, 
plenty  of-  difficulties  in  the  detection  of  fraud,  plenty  of 
instances  showing  the  inability  of  purchasers  to  protect 
themselves,  are  quoted  by  the  advocates  of  each  proposed 
recourse  to  official  regulation;  and  in  each  case  it  is  urged 
that  here,  at  any  rate,  official  regulation  is  required.  Yet 
does  experience  disprove  these  inferences  one  after  another, 
teaching  us  that,  in  the  long  run,  the  interest  of  the  con 
sumer  is  not  only  an  efficient  guarantee  for  the  goodness 
of  the  things  consumed,  but  the  best  guarantee.  Is  it 
not  unwise,  then,  to  trust  for  the  hundredth  time  in  one 


QUALITY   OF    SCHOOLS.  369 

of  these  plausible  but  deceptive  conclusions  ?  „  Is  it  not 
rational,  rather,  to  infer,  that  however  much  appearances 
are  to  the  contrary,  the  choice  of  the  commodity — educa 
tion,  like  the  choice  of  all  other  commodities,  may  be 
safely  left  to  the  discretion  of  buyers  ?  x 

Still  more  reasonable  will  this  inference  appear  on  ob 
serving  that  the  people  are  not,  after. all,  such  incompetent 
judges  of  education  as  they  seem.  -  Ignorant  parents  are 
generally  quick  enough  to  discern  the  effects  of  good  or 
bad  teaching ;  will  note  them  in  the  children  of  others, 
and  act  accordingly.  Moreover  it  is  easy  for  them  to  fol 
low  the  example  of  the  better  instructed,  and  choose  the 
same  schools.  Or  they  may  get  over  the  difficulty  by 
asking  advice ;  and  there  is  generally  some  one  both  able 
and  willing  to  give  the  uneducated  parent  a  trustworthy 
answer  to  his  inquiry  about  teachers.  Lastly,  there  is 
the  test  of  price.  With  education,  as  with  other  things, 
price  is  a  tolerably  safe  index  of  value ;  it  is  one  open  to 
all  classes ;  and  it  is  one  which  the  poor  instinctively  ap 
peal  to  in  the  matter  of  schools ;  for  it  is  notorious  that 
they  look  coldly  at  very  cheap  or  gratuitous  instruction.^.* 

But  even  admitting  that,  whilst  this  defect  of  judg 
ment  is  not  virtually  so  extreme  as  is  alleged,  it  is  never 
theless  great,  the  need  for  interference  is  still  denied. 
The  evil  is  undergoing  rectification,  as  all  analogous  ones 
are  or  have  been.  The  rising  generation  will  better  un 
derstand  what  good  education  is  than  their  parents  do, 
and  their  descendants  will  have  clearer  conceptions  of  it 
still.  Whoso  thinks  the  slowness  of  the  process  a  suffi 
cient  reason  for  meddling,  must,  to  be  consistent,  meddle 
in  all  other  things ;  for  the  ignorance  which  in  every  case 
serves  as  an  excuse  for  state-interposition  is  of  very  grad 
ual  cure.  The  errors  both  of  consumers  and  producers 
often  take  generations  to  set  right.  Improvements  in  the 
carrying  on  of  commerce,  in  manufactures,  and  especially 
16* 


3 TO  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

in  agriculture,  spread  almost  imperceptibly.  Take  rota 
tion  of  crops  for  an  example.  And  if  this  tardiness  is  a 
valid  argument  for  interference  in  one  case,  why  not  in 
others  ?  Why  not  have  farms  superintended  by  govern 
ment,  because  it  may  take  a  century  for  farmers  generally 
to  adopt  the  plans  suggested  by  modern  science  ? 

Did  we  duly  realiz^the  fact  that  society  is  a  growth, 
and  not  a  manufacture — a  thing  that  makes  itself,  and  not 
a  thing  that  can  be  artificially  made^-we  should  fall  into 
fewer  mistakes;,  and  we  should  see  that  amongst  other  im 
perfections  tmVincompetence  of  the  masses  to  distinguish 
good  instruction  from  bad,  is  being  outgrown. 

§  6.  When  in  the  matter  of  education  "  the  interest 
and  judgment  of  the  consumer"  are  said  not  to  be  "suffi 
cient  security  for  the  goodness  of  the  commodity,"  and 
when  it  is  argued  that  government  superintendence  is 
therefore  needful,  a  very  questionable  assumption  is  made : 
the  assumption,  namely,  that  "  the  interest  and  judgment" 
of  a  government  are  sufficient  security.  ISTow  there  is 
good  reason  to  dispute  this,  nay,  even  to  assert  that,  tak 
ing  the  future  into  account,  they  offer  much  less  security. 

The  problem  is,  how  best  to  develop  minds:  a  prob 
lem  amongst  the  most  difficult — may  we  not  say,  the  most 
difficult  ?  Two  things  are  needful  for  its  solution.  First, 
to  know  what  minds  should  be  fashioned  into.  Next,  to 
know  how  they  may  be  so  fashioned.  From  the  work  to 
be  done,  turn  we  now  to  the  proposed  doers  of  it.  Men 
of  education  (as  the  word  goes)  they  no  doubt  are  ; 
well-meaning,  many  of  them ;  thoughtful,  some ;  philo 
sophical,  a  few;  men,  however,  for  the  most  part,  born 
with  silver  spoons  in  their  mouths,  and  prone  to  regard 
human  affairs  as  reflected  in  these — somewhat  distortedly. 
Very  comfortable  lives  are  led  by  the  majority  of  them, 
and  hence  "  things  as  they  are  "  find  favour  in  their  eyes. 


IDEAS    OF   THE   RULING    CLASSES.  371 

For  their  tastes — they  are  shown  in  the  subordination  of 
national  business?  to  the  shooting  of  grouse  and  the  chas 
ing  of  foxes.""''  For  their  pride — it  is  in  wide  estates  or 
long  pedigrees ;  and  should  the  family  coat  of  arms  bear 
some  such  "ancient  motto  as  "  Strike  hard,"  or,  "  Furth  for 
tune,  and  fill  the  fetters,"  it  is  a  great  happiness.  As  to 
'their  ideal  of  society,  it  is  either  a  sentimental  feudalism ; 
or  it  is  a  state,  something  like  the  present,  under  which 
the  people  shall  be  respectful  to  their  betters, 'and  "con 
tent  with  that  station  of  life  to  which  it  has  pleased  God 
to  call  them ; "  or  it  is  state  arranged  with  the  view  of 
making  each  labourer  the  most  efficient  producing  tool, 
to  the  end  that  the  accumulation  of  wealth  may  be  the 
greatest  possible..  '  Add  to  this,  thafc4heir  notions  of  moral 
discipline  are  shown  in  the  maintenance  of  capital  punish 
ment,  and  in  the  sending  of  their  sons  to  schools  where 
flogging  is  practised?'  and  where  they  themselves  were 
brought  up.  Now  could  the  judgment  of  such  respecting 
the  commodity — education,  be  safely  relied  on  ?  Certainly 
not. 

Still  less  might  their  "  interest "  be  trusted.  Though 
at  variance  with  that  of  the  people,  it  would  inevitably 
be  followed  in  preference.  The  self-seeking  which,  con 
sciously  or  unconsciously,  sways  rulers  in  other  cases, 
would  sway  them  in  this  likewise — could  not  fail  to  do  so, 
whilst  the  character  of  men  is  what  it  is.  With  taxation 
unequally  distributed,  with  such  a  glaringly  unjust  appor 
tionment  of  representatives  to  population,  with  a  nepotism 
that  fills  lucrative  places'/with  Greys  and  Elliots,  with  a 
staff  of  a  hundred  animals  more  than  are  wanted,  with 
lavish  pensions  to  the  undeserving,  with  a  system  of  re 
trenchment  which  discharges  common  men  and  retains 
officers,  and  with  such  votes  as  those  given  by  the  mili 
tary,  the  naval,  the  landed,  and  the  clerically-related  mem 
bers  of  parliament,  we  may  be  quite  sure  that  a  state-edu- 


372  NATIONAL    EDUCATION. 

cation  would  be  administered  for  the  advantage  of  those 
in  power,  rather  than  for  the  advantage  of  the  nation. 
To  hope  for  any  thing  else  is  to  fall  into  the  old  error  of 
looking  for  grapes  from  thorns.  Nothing  can  be  more 
truly  Utopian  than  expecting  that,  with  men  and  things  as 
they  are,  the  influences  which  have  vitiated  all  other  institu 
tions  would  not  vitiate  this  one.^> 

Thus,  even  were  it  true  that  in  the  matter  of  educa 
tion  "  the  interest  and  judgment  of  the  consumer  are  not 
sufficient  security  for  the  goodness  of  the  commodity,"  the 
wisdom  of  superseding  them  by  the  "  interest  and  judg 
ment  "  of  a  government  is  by  no  means  obvious.  It  may, 
indeed,  be  said  that  the  argument  proves  only  the  unfit- 
riess  of  existing  governments  to  become  national  teachers, 
and  not  the  unfitness  of  a  government  normally  consti 
tuted':  whereas  the  object  of  inquiry  being  to  determine 
what  a  government  should  do,  the  hypothesis  must  be 
that  the  government  is  what  it  should  be.  To  this  the 
reply  is,  that  the  nature  of  the  allegation  to  be  met  neces 
sitates  a  descent  to  the  level  of  present  circumstances.  It 
is  on  the  defective  "interest  and  judgment"  of  the  people, 
as  they  now  are,  that  the  plea  for  legislative  superintend 
ence  is  based ;  and,  consequently,  in  criticizing  this  plea 
we  must  take  government  as  it  now  is.  We  cannot  reason 
as  though  government  were  Avhat  it  should  be ;  since,  be 
fore  it  can  become  so,  any  alleged  deficiency  of  "  interest 
and  judgment "  on  the  part  of  the  people  must  have  dis 
appeared. 

§  7.  The  impolicy  of  setting  up  a  national  organiza 
tion  for  cultivating  the  popular  mind,  and  commissioning 
the  government  to  superintend  this  organization,  is  further 
seen  in  the  general  truth  that  every  such  o^rganization-is 
in  spirit  conservative,  and  not  progressive.  (All  institu 
tions  have  an  instinct  of  self-preservation  growing  out  of 


CONSERVATIVE   AND   UNCHANGING.  3T3 

the  selfishness  of  those  connected  with  them.  Being 
dependent  for  their  vitality  upon  the  continuance  of  exist 
ing  arrangements,  they  naturally  uphold  these.  Their 
roots  are  in  the  past  and  the  present ;  never  in  the  future. 
Change  threatens  them,  modifies  them,  eventually  de 
stroys  them ;  hence  to  change  they  are  uniformly  opposed./ 
On  the  other  hand,  education,  properly  so  called,  is  closely 
associated  with  change — is  its  pioneer — is  the  never- 
sleeping  agent  of  revolution's  always  fitting  men  for 
higher  things,  and  tmfitting*them  for  things  as  they 
are.  ^Therefore,  between  institutions  whose  very  exist 
ence^  depends  upon  man  continuing  what  he  is,  and  true 
education,  which  is  one  of  the  instruments  for  making 
him  something  other  than  he  is,  there  must  always  be 
enmity. 

From  the  time  of  the  Egyptian  priesthood  downwards, 
the  conduct  of  corporations,  whether  political,  ecclesiasti 
cal,  or  educational,  has  given  proof  of  this.  ^Sorue  300 
years  B.C.,  unlicensed  schools  were  forbidden  by  the 
Athenian  senate.  In  Rome,  the  liberty  of  teaching  was 
attacked  twice  before  the  Christian  era ;  and  again,  after 
wards,  by  the  Emperor  Julian.  The  existing  continental 
governments  show,  by  their  analogous  policy,  how  persist 
ent  the  tendency  is.  "7  In  the  universality  of  censorships 
we  see  the  same  fact  further  illustrated.  The  celebrated 
saying  of  the  Empress  Catharine  to  her  prime  minister, 
well  exhibits  the  way  in  which  rulers  regard  the  spread  of 
knowledge.  And^yhenever  governments  have  undertaken 
to  educate,  it  has  been  with  the  view  of  forestalling  that 
spontaneous  education  which  threatened  their  own  su 
premacy.  Witness  the  case  of  China,  where  diligently- 
impressed  ideas,  such  as,  "  O !  how  magnificent  are  the 
affairs  of  government !  "  "  O  !  what  respect  is  due  to  the 
officers  of  government !  "  sufficiently  indicate  the  inten 
tion.  Witness,  again,  the  case  of  Austria,  where,  in  accord- 


374  NATIONAL    EDUCATION. 

ance  with  the  will  of  the  Emperor  Francis,  the  training 
of  the  popular  mind  was  entrusted  to  the  Jesuits,  that 
they  might  "  counteract  the  propagandism  of  liberty,  by 
the  propagandism  of  superstition."  ^7  Nor  have  there 
been  w anting  signs  of  a  like  spirit  here  in  England.  That 
attempt  in  Cobbett's  day  to  put  down  cheap  literature, 
by  an  act  which  prevented  weekly  publications  from 
being  sold  for  less  than  sixpence,  unmistakably  indicated 
it.  It  was  again  exhibited  in  the  reluctance  with  which 
the  newspaper  stamp  duty  was  reduced,  when  resistance 
had  become  useless.  And  we  may  still  see  it  in  the 
double-facedness  of  a  legislature  which  professes  to  favour 
popular  enlightenment,  and  yet  continues  to  raise  a  mil 
lion  and  a  quarter  sterling  yearly  from  "  taxes  on  knowl 
edge." 

How  unfriendly  ^11  ecclesiastical  bodies  have  been  to 
the  spread  of  education  every  one  knows.  The  obstinacy 
shown  by  the  Brahmin  in  fighting  against  the  truths  of 
modern  science — the  fanaticism  with  which  the  Mahome 
tan  doctor  ignores  all  books  but  the  Koran — and  the  prej 
udice  fostered  by  the  religious  institutions  of  our  own 
country  against  the  very  name  of  philosophy — are  kindred 
illustrations  of  the  conduct  which  this  self-conserving  in 
stinct  produces.  In  that  saying  of  the  monks,  "  We  must 
put  down  printing,  or  printing  will  put  down  us,"  the  uni 
versal  motive  was  plainly  expressed ;  as  it  was,  again, 
through  the  mouth  of  that  French  bishop  who  denounced 

*  And  not  without  success,  according  to  Mr.  Wilde,  who  (writing 
before  the  late  revolution)  tells  us,  by  way  of  panegyric  upon  the  Austrian 
system  of  education,  that  the  people  "sigh  not  for  a  state  of  political 
liberty  about  which  they  know  nothing.  The  government  wisely  prevent 
ing  their  minds  from  being  inflamed  by  those  blisters  upon  society  that 
have  written  and  preached  our  own  countrymen  into  the  fever  of  dis 
content  and  disaffection,  the  effects  of  which  are  now  so  visible  in  Great 
Britain."  (!) 


ITS   BIGOTED   CONSERVATISM.  375 

the  Bell  and  Lancaster  systems  as  inventions  of  the  devil. 
NOT  let  any  one  conclude  that  the  educational  zeal  latterly 
manifested  by  Church  clergy  indicates  a  new  animus. 
Those  who  remember  the  bitterness  with  which  Sunday 
schools  were  at  first  assailed  by  them;  and  those  who 
mark  how  keenly  they  now  compete  with  dissenters  for 
the  children  of  the  poor,  can  see  clearly  enough  that  they 
are  endeavouring  to  make  the  best  of  a  necessity — that, 
having  a  more  or  less  defined  consciousness  of  the  inevita 
bility  of  educational  progress,  they  wish  to  educate  the  peo 
ple  in  allegiance  to  the  Church. 

Still  more  manifest  becomes  this  obstructive  tendency 
on  considering  that  the  very  organizations  devised  for  the 
spreading  of  knowledge,  may  themselves  act  as  suppress 
ors  of  it.  Thus  it  is  said,  that  Oxford  was  one  of  the  last 
places  in  which  the  Newtonian  philosophy  was  acknowl 
edged.  We  read  again,  in  the  life  of  Locke,  that  "  there 
was  a  meeting  of  the  heads  of  houses  at  Oxford,  where 
it  was  proposed  to  censure  and  discourage  the  reading 
of  this  essay  (On  the  Human  Understanding) ;  and  after 
various  debates,  it  was  concluded  that  without  any  public 
censure  each  head  of  a  house  shall  endeavour  to  prevent 
its  being  read  in  his  own  college."  At  Eton,  too,  in  Shel 
ley's  time,  "  Chemistry  was  a  forbidden  thing,"  even  to 
the  banishment  of  chemical  treatises.  So  uniformly  has 
it  been  the  habit  of  these  endowed  institutions  to  close 
the  door  against  innovations,  that  they  are  amongst  the 
last  places  to  which  any  one  looks  for  improvements  in 
the  art  of  teaching,  or  a  better  choice  of  subjects  to  be 
taught.  The  attitude  of  the  universities  toward  natural 
science  has  been  that  of  contemptuous  non-recognition. 
College  authorities  have  long  resisted,  either  actively  or 
passively,  the  making  of  physiology,  chemistry,  geology, 
&c.,  subjects  of  examination ;  and  only  of  late,  under  pres 
sure  from  with,  and  under  the  fear  of  being  supplanted 


3T6  '  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

?    ^   '**  ¥  ^  * 

by  rival  institutions,  have  new  studies  been  gingerly 
taken  to. 

Now,,  although  vis  inertice  may  be  very  useful  in  its 
place — although  the  resistance  of  office-holders  has  its  func 
tion — although  we  must  not  quarrel  with  this  instinct  of 
self-preservation  which  gives  to  institutions  their  vitality, 
because  it  also  upholds  them  through  a  lingering  decrepi 
tude — we  may  yet  wisely  refuse  to  increase  its  natural 
effect.  It  is  very  necessary  to  have  in  our  social  economy 
a  conservative  force  as  well  as  a  reforming  one,  that  there 
maybe  progress  for  the  resultant ;  but  it  is  highly  impoli 
tic  to  afford  the  one  an  artificial  advantage  over  the  other. 
To  establish  a  state-education  is  to  do  this,  however.  The 
teaching  organization  itself,  and  the  government  which 
directs  it,  will  inevitably  lean  to  things  as  they  are ;  and 
to  give  them  control  over  the  national  mind,  is  to  give 
them  the  means  of  repressing  aspirations  after  things 
as  they  should  be.  Just  that  culture  which  seems  com 
patible  with  their  own  preservation  will  these  institutions 
allow,  whilst  just  that  culture  which,  by  advancing 
society,  threatens  to  sap  their  own  foundations,  or,  in 
other  words — just  that  culture  which  is  most  valuable, 
they  will  oppose. 

The  sanguine  will  perhaps  hope  that,  though  this  has 
been  the  rule  hitherto,  it  will  not  be  the  rule  in  future. 
Let  them  not  deceive  themselves.  So  long  as  men  pursue 
private  advantage  at  the  expense  of  the  common  weal, 
that  is  to  say — so  long  as  government  is  needful  at  all,  so 
long  will  this  be  true.  Less  marked  the  tendency  will  no 
doubt  be  in  proportion  as  men  are  less  unjustly  selfish. 
But  to  whatever  extent  they  lack  perfect  conscientious 
ness,  to  the  same  extent  will  vested  interests  sway  them, 
and  to  the  same  extent  will  institutions  resist  change. 

§   8.     Did  the  reader  ever  watch  a  boy  in  the  first 


CHILDISH   IMPATIENCE   OF   NATURAL  "PROCESSES.       377 

• 

heat  of  a  gardening  fit  ?  The  sight  is  an  amusing,  and  not 
uninstructive  one.  Probably  a  slice  of  a  border — some 
couple  of  square  yards  or  so — has  been  made  over  to  him 
for  his  exclusive  use.  No  small  accession  of  dignity,  and 
not  a  little  pride  of  proprietorship,  does  he  exhibit.  So  long 
as  the  enthusiasm  lasts,  he  never  tires  of  contemplating  his 
territory;  and  every  companion  and  every  visitor  with 
whom  the  liberty  can  be  taken,  is  pretty  sure  to  be  met  Avith 
the  request — "  Come  and  see  my  garden."  Note  chiefly,  how 
ever,  with  what  anxiety  the  growth  of  a  few  scrubby  plants 
is  regarded.  Three  or  four  times  a  day  will  the  little  urchin 
rush  out  to  look  at  them.  How  provokingly  slow  their 
progress  seems  to  him.  Each  morning  on  getting  up  he 
hopes  to  find  some  marked  change ;  and  lo,  every  thing 
appears  just  as  it  did  the  day  before.  When  will  the 
blossoms  come  out  ?  For  nearly  a  week  has  some  forward 
bud  been  promising  him  the  triumph  of  a  first  flower,  and 
still  it  remains  closed.  Surely  there  must  be  something 
wrong  !  Perhaps  the  leaves  have  stuck  fast.  Ah !  that  is 
the  reason,  no  doubt.  And  so  ten  to  one  you  shall  some 
day  catch  our  young  florist  very  busily  engaged  in  pulling 
open  the  calyx,  and,  it  may  be,  trying  to  unfold  a  few  of 
the  petals. 

Somewhat  like  this  childish  impatience  ft  the  feeling 
exhibited  by  not  a  few  state-educationists.  Both  they 
and  their  type  show  a  lack  of  faith  in  natural  forces — 
almost  an  ignorance  that  there  are  such  forces./  In  both 
there  is  the  same  dissatisfaction  with  the  ordained  rate  of 
progress.  And  by  both,  artificial  means  are  used  to 
remedy  what  are  conceived  to  be  nature's  failures.  -With 
in  these  few  years  men  have  all  at  once  been  awakened  to 
the  importance  of  instructing  the  people.  That  to  which 
they  were  awhile  since  indifferent  or  even  hostile  has  sud 
denly  become  an  object  of  enthusiasm.  With  all  the 
ardour  of  recent  converts — with  all  a  novice's  inordinate 


378  "  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

• 

expectations — with  all  the  eagerness  of  a  lately-aroused 
desire — do  they  await  the  hoped-for  result ;  and,  with  the 
unreasonableness  ever  attendant  upon  such  a  state  of  mind, 
are  dissatisfied,  because  the  progress  from  general  igno 
rance  to  universal  enlightenment  has  not  been  completed 
in  a  generation.  ?  One  would  have  thought  it  sufficiently 
clear  to  everybody  that  the  great  changes  taking  place  in 
this  w^orld  of  ours  are  uniformly  slow.  Continents  are 
upheaved  at  the  rate  of  a  foot  or  two  in  a  century.  The 
deposition  of  a  delta  is  the  work  of  tens  of  thousands  of 
years.  The  transformation  of  barren  rock  into  life-sup 
porting  soil  takes  countless  ages.  If  any  think  society 
advances  under  a  different  law,  let  them  read.  Has  it  not 
required  the  whole  Christian  era  to  abolish  slavery  in 
Europe  ?  as  far  at  least  as  it  is  abolished.  Did  not  a  hun 
dred  generations  live  and  die  while  picture-writing  grew 
into  printing?  Have  not  science  and  commerce  and 
mechanical  skill  increased  at  a  similarly  tardy  pace  ? 
Yet  are  men  disappointed  that  a  pitiful  fifty  years  has  not 
sufficed  for  thorough  popular  enlightenment !  Although 
within  this  period  an  advance  has  been  made  far  beyond 
what  the  calm  thinker  would  have  expected — far  beyond 
what  the  past  rate  of  progress  in  human  affairs  seemed  to 
prophesy — yet  ^  do  these  so  impatient  people  summarily 
condemn  the  voluntary  system  as  a  failure"!  A  natural 
process — a  process  spontaneously  set  up — a  process  of  self- 
unfolding  which  the  national  mind  had  commenced,  is 
pooh-poohed  because  it  has  not  wrought  a  total  transfor 
mation  in  the  course  of  what  constitutes  but  a  day  in  the 
life  of  humanity !  And  then,  to  make  up  for  nature's  in- 
competency,  the  unfolding  must  be  hastened  by  legisla 
tive  fingerings ! 

§   9.     There  is,  indeed,  one   excuse  for  attempts  to 
spread  education  by  artificial  means,  namely,  the  anxiety 


EDUCATION   AND   CEIME.  379 

to  diminish  crime,  of  which  education  is  supposed  to  be  a 
preventive.  "  We  hold,"  says  Mr.  Macaulay,  "  that  who 
ever  has  the  right  to  hang  has  the  right  to  educate."  * 
And  in  a  letter  relative  to  the  Manchester  district-system, 
Miss  Martineau  writes—"  ]STor  can  I  see  that  political 
economy  objects  to  the  general  rating  for  educational  pur 
poses.  As  a  mere  police-tax  this  rating  would  be  a  very 
cheap  affair.  It  would  cost  us  much  less  than  we  now 
pay  for  juvenile  depravity."  In  both  which  remarks  this 
prevalent  belief  is  implied. 

Now,  with  all  respect  to  the  many  high  authorities 
holding  it,  the  truth  of  this  belief  may  be  disputed.  ^We 
have  no  evidence  that  education,  as  commonly  understood, 
is  a  preventive  of  crime. "ptfThose  perpetually  reiterated 
newspaper  paragraphs,  in  which  the  ratios  of  instructed  to 
uninstructed  convicts  are  so  triumphantly  stateaj"jrove 
just  nothing.  Before  any  inference  can  be  drawn,  it 
must  be  shown  that  these  instructed  and  uninstructed 
convicts,  come  from  two  equal  sections  of  society,  alike  in 
all  other  respects  but  that  of  knowledge — similar  in  rank 
and  occupation,  having  similar  advantages,  labouring  under 
similar  temptations.  -^But  this  is  not  only  not  the  truth ; 
it  is  nothing  like  the'truth.  The  many  ignorant  criminals 
belong  to  a  most  unfavourably  circumstanced  class ; 
whilst  the  few  educated  ones^are  from  a  class  compara 
tively  favourecFT?  As  things  stand  it  would  be  equally 
logical  to  infei'  that  crime  arises  from  going  without  ani 
mal  food,  or  from  living  in  badly-ventilated  rooms,  or 
from  wearing  dirty  shirts  ;  for  w^ere  the  inmates  of  a  gaol 
to  be  catechized,  it  would  doubtless  be  found  that  the 
majority  of  them  had  been  placed  in  these  conditions. 
Ignorance  and  crime  are  not  cause  and  effect ;  they  are 
coincident  results  of  the  same  cause.  To  be  wholly 
untaught  is  to  have  moved  amongst  those  whose  incen- 
*  Quoted  from  a  speech  at  Edinburgh. 


380  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

lives  to  wrong-doing  are  strongest ;  to  be  partially  taught 
is  to  have  been  one  of  a  class  subject  to  less  urgent  temp 
tations  ;  to  be  well  taught  is  to  have  lived  almost  beyond 
the  reach  of  the  usual  motives  for  transgression.  Igno 
rance,  therefore  (at  least  in  the  statistics  referred  to), 
simply  indicates  the  presence  of  crime-producing  influ 
ences,  and /can  no  more  be  called  the  cause  of  crime  than 
the  falling  of  a  barometer  can  be  called  the  cause  of  rain.  / 

So  far  indeed  from  proving  that  morality  is  increased 
by  education,  the  facts  prove,  if  any  thing,  the  reverse. 
Thus  we  are  told,  in  a  report  by  the  Rev.  Joseph  Kings- 
mill,  head  chaplain  of  Pentonville  Prison,  that  the  propor 
tion  borne  by  the  educated  to  the  uneducated  convicts  is 
fully  as  high  as  that  which  exists  between  the  educated 
and  the  uneducated  classes  in  the  general  population; 
although,  as  just  explained,  we  might  reasonably  expect, 
that  having  had  fewer  temptations,  the  educated  convicts 
would  bear  a  smaller  ratio  to  their  class.  Again,  it 
has  been  shown  from  government  returns — "  That  the 
number  of  juvenile  offenders  in  the  metropolis  has  been 
steadily  increasing  every  year  since  the  institution  of  the 
Ragged  School  Union ;  and  that  whereas  the  number  of 
criminals  who  cannot  read  and  write  has  decreased  from 
24,856  (in  1844)  to  22,968  (in  1848)— or  no  less  than  1,888 
in  that  period — the  number  of  those  who  can  read  and 
write  imperfectly  has  increased  from.  33,337  to  36,229 — or 
2,857 — in  the  same  time." — Morning  Chronicle,  April  25, 
1850.  Another  contributor  to  the  series  of  articles  on 
"  Labour  and  the  Poor,"  from  which  the  above  statement 
is  quoted,  remarks  that  "  the  mining  population  (in  the 
north)  are  exceedingly  low  in  point  of  education  and  in* 
telligence  ;  and  yet  they  contradict  the  theories  generally 
entertained  upon  the  connection  of  ignorance  with  crime, 
by  presenting  the  least  criminal  section  of  the  population 
of  England." — Morning  Chronicle^  Dec.  27,  1849.  And, 


THE  IGNORANT  CLASSES  NOT  THE  MOST  CRIMINAL.    381 

speaking  of  the  women  employed  in  the  iron-works  and 
collieries  throughout  South  Wales,  he  says — "  their  igno 
rance  is  absolutely  awful ;  yet  the  returns  show  in  them  a 
singular  immunity  from  crime." — Morning  Chronicle, 
March  21,  1850. 

If  these  testimonies  are  thought  insufficient,  they  may 
be  enforced  by  that  of  Mr.  Fletcher,  who  has  entered 
more  elaborately  into  this  question  than  perhaps  any  other 
writer  of  the  day.  Summing  up  the  results  of  his  investi 
gations,  he  says  : 

"  1.  In  comparing  the  gross  commitments  for  criminal 
offences  with  the  proportion  of  instruction  in  each  district, 
there  is  found  to  be  a  small  balance  in  favour  of  thomost 
instructed  districts  in  the  years  of  most  industrial  depres 
sion  (1842-'3-'4),  but  a  greater  one  against  them  in  the 
years  of  less  industrial  depression  (1845-'6-"7)  ;  while  in 
comparing  the  more  with  the  less  instructed  portions  of 
each  district,  the  final  result  is  against  the  former  at  both 
periods,  though  fourfold  at  the  latter  what  it  is  at  the 
former. 

"  2.  No  correction  for  the  ages  of  the  population  in  dif 
ferent  districts,  to  meet  the  excess  of  criminals  at  certain 
younger  periods  of  life,  will  change  the  character  of  this 
superficial  evidence  against  instruction ;  every  legitimate 
allowance  of  the  kind  having  already  been  made  in  arriv 
ing  at  these  results. 

"  3.  Down  to  this  period,  therefore,  the  comparison  of 
the  criminal  and  educational  returns  of  this,  any  more  than 
of  any  other  country  of  Europe,  has  afforded  no  sound 
statistical  evidence  in  favour,  and  as  little  against,  the 
moral  effects  associated  with  instruction,  as  actually  dis 
seminated  among  the  people."  * 

*  Summary  of  the  Moral  Statistics  of  England  and  Wales.  By  Joseph 
Fletcher,  Esq.,  Barrister-at-Law,  one  of  Her  Majesty's  Inspectors  of 
Schools. 


382  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

To  all  which  evidence  may  be  added  that  of  Messrs. 
Gurrea  and  Dupin,  who  have  shown  that  the  most 
highly-educated  districts  in  France  are  the  most  criminal 
Districts. 

The  fact  is,  that  scarcely  any  connection  exists  between 
morality  and  the  discipline  of  ordinary  teaching.  Mere 
culture  of  the  intellect  (and  education  as  usually  conducted 
amounts  to  little  more)  is  hardly  at  all  operative  upon  con 
duct.  Creeds  pasted  upon  the  memory,  good  principles 
learnt  by  rote,  lessons  in  right  and  wrong,  will  not  eradi 
cate  vicious  propensities,  though  people,  in  spite  of  their 
experience  as  parents,  and  as  citizens,  persist  in  hoping 
they  will//  All  history,  both  of  the  race  and  of  individ- 
uals^goes  to  prove  that  in  the  majority  of  cases  precepts 
do  not  act  at  alIT7  [And  where  they  seem  to  act,  it  is  not 
by  'them,  but  by  preexisting  feelings  which  respond  to 
them,  that  the  effects  are  really  produced.  Intellect  is 
not  a  power,  but  an  instrument — not  a  thing  which  itself 
moves  and  works,  but  a  thing  which  is  moved  and 
worked  by  forces  behind  it.  To  say  that  men  are  ruled 
by  reason,  is  as  irrational  as  to  say  that  men  are  ruled  by 
their  eyes.  Reason  is  an  eye — the  eye  through  which  the 
desires  see  their  way  to  gratification.  And  educating  it 
only  makes  it  a  better  eye — gives  it  a  vision  more  accu 
rate  and  more  comprehensive — does  not  at  all  alter  the 
desires  subserved  by  it.  However  far  seeing  you  make 
it,  the  passions  will  still  determine  the  directions  in  which 
it  shall  be  turned — the  objects  on  which  it  shall  dwell. 
Just  those  ends  which  the  instincts  or  sentiments  propose 
will  the  intellect  be  employed  to  accomplish  :  culture  of 
it  having  done  nothing  but  increase  the  ability  to  accom 
plish  them.  Probably  some  will  urge  that  enlightening 
men  enables  them  to  discern  the  penalties  which  naturally 
attach  to  wrong-doing ;  and  in  a  certain  sense  this  is  true. 
But  it  is  only  superficially  true.  Though  they  may  learn 


EDUCATION  WILL  NOT  CUKE  CRIME.        383 

that  the  grosser  crimes  commonly  bring  retribution  in 
one  shape  or  other,  they  will  not  learn  that  the  subtler 
ones  do.  Their  sins  will  merely  be  made  more  Machiavel 
lian.  If,  as  Coleridge  says,  "  a  knave  is  a  fool  with  a  cir 
cumbendibus,"  then  by  instructing  the  knave  you  do  but 
make  the  circumbendibus  a  wider  one.  Did  much  knowl 
edge  and  piercing  intelligence  suffice  to  make  men  good, 
then  Bacon  should  have  been  honest,  and  Napoleon 
should  have  been  just.  Where  the  character  is  defective, 
intellect,  no  matter  how  high,  fails  to  regulate  rightly, 
because  predominant  desires  falsify  its  estimates.  Nay, 
even  a  distinct  foresight  of  evil  consequence^  will  not 
restrain  when  strong  passions  are  at  work.  *  How  else 
does  it  happen  that  men  will  get  drunk,  though  they 
knoiv  drunkenness  will  entail  on  them  suffering,  and  dis 
grace,  and  (as  with  the  poor)  even  starvation  ?  How  else 
is  it  that  medical  students,  who  Jcnoio  the  diseases  brought 
on  by  dissolute  living  better  than  other  young  men,  are 
just  as  reckless,  and  even  mere  reckless  ?  How  else  is 
it  that  the  London  thief,  who  has  been  at  the  treadmill  a 
dozen  times,  will  steal  again  as  soon  as  he  is  at  liberty  ? 
How  else  is  it  that  people,  who  have  all  their  lives  long 
been  taught  Christianity,  Avill  not  behave  as  Christians, 
though  they  believe  that  dire  penalties  are  entailed  by 
behaving  otherwise  ? 

It  is,  indeed  strange  that  with  the  facts  of  daily  life 
before  them  in  the  street,  in  the  counting-house,  and  in 
the  family,  thinking  men  should  still  expect  education  to 
cure  crime.  /If  armies  of  teachers,  regarded  with  a  certain 
superstitious  reverence,  have  been  unable  to  purify  society 
in  all  these  eighteen  centuries,  it  is  hardly  likely  that 
other  armies  of  teachers,  not  so  regarded,  will  be  able  to 
do  it.  If  natural  persuasion,  backed  by  supernatural 
authority,  will  not  induce  men  to  do  as  they  would  be 
done  by,  it  is  hardly  likely  that  natural  persuasion  alone 


384  NATIONAL    EDUCATION. 

will  induce  them.  If  hopes  of  eternal  happiness  and 
terrors  of  eternal  damnation  fail  to  make  human  beings 
virtuous,  it  is  hardly  likely  that  the  commendations  and 
reproofs  of  the  schoolmaster  will  succeed. 

There  is,  in  fact,  a  quite  sufficient  r-eason  for  failure — 
no  less  a  reason  than  the  impossibility  of  the  task.  The 
expectation  that  crime  may  presently  be  cured,  whether 
by- state-education,  or  the  silent  system,  or  the  separate 
system,  or  any  other  system,  is  one  of  those  Utopianisms 
fallen  into  by  people  who  pride  themselves  on  being  prac 
tical.  /  Crime  is  incurable,  save  by  that  gradual  process 
of  adaptation  to  the  social  state  which  humanity  is  under 
going.  Crime  is  the  continual  breaking  out  of  the  old 
unadapted  nature — the  index  of  a  character  unfitted  to  its 
conditions — and  only  as  fast  as  the  unfitness  diminishes 
can'crime  diminishy/To  hope  for  some  prompt  method  of 
putting  down  crime,  is  in  reality  to  hope  for  some  prompt 
method  of  putting  down  all  evils — laws,  governments, 
taxation,  poverty,  caste,  and  the  rest ;  for  they  and  crime 
have  the  some  root.  Reforming  men's  conduct  without 
reforming  their  natures  is  impossible ;  and  to  expect  that 
their  natures  may  be  reformed,  otherwise  than  by  the 
forces  which  are  slowly  civilizing  us,  is  visionary.  Schemes 
of  discipline  or  culture  are  of  use  only  in  proportion  as 
they  organically  alter  the  national  character,  and  the  ex 
tent  to  which  they  do  this  is  by  no  means  great.  It  is 
not  by  humanly-devised  agencies,  good  as  these  may  be  in 
their  way,  but  it  is  by  the  never-ceasing  action  of  circum 
stances  upon  men — by  the  constant  pressure  of  their  new 
conditions  upon  them — that  the  required  change  is  mainly 
effected. 

Meanwhile  it  may  be  remarked,  that  whatever  moral 
benefit  can  be  effected  by  education,  must  be  effected 
by  an  education  which  is  emotional  rather  than  per 
ceptive.  If,  in  place  of  making  a  child  understand  that 


NEED  OF  EMOTIONAL  EDUCATION.         385 

this  thing  is  right  and  the  other  wrong,  you  make  it 
feel  that  they  are  so — if  you  make  virtue  loved  and 
vice  loathed — if  you  arouse  a  noble  desire,  and  make 
torpid  an  inferior  one — if  you  bring  into  life  a  previ 
ously  dormant  sentiment — if  you  cause  a  sympathetic 
impulse  to  get  the  better  of  one  that  is  selfish — if,  in  short, 
you  produce  a  state  of  mind  to  which  proper  behaviour  is 
natural,  spontaneous,  instinctive,  you  do  some  good.  But 
no  drilling  in  catechisms,  no  teaching  of  moral  codes,  can 
effect  this.  Only  by  repeatedly  awakening  the  appro 
priate  emotions  can  character  be  changed.  Mere  ideas 
received  by  the  intellect,  meeting  no  response  from 
within — having  no  roots  there — are  quite  inoperative 
upon  conduct,  and  are  quickly  forgotten  upon  entering 
into  life. 

Perhaps  it  will  be  said  that  a  discipline  like  this  now 
described  as  the  only  efficient  one,  might  be  undertaken 
by  the  state.  No  doubt  it  might.  But  from  all  legis 
lative  attempts  at  emotional  education  may  He*aven 
defend  us ! 

§  10.  Yet  another  objection  remains.  Just  as  we 
found,  on  close  examination,  by  poor-laws  a  government 
cannot  really  cure  distress,  but  can  only  shift  it  from  one 
section  of  the  community  to  another  (p.  359),  so,  astound 
ing  as  the  assertion  looks,  we  shall  find  that  a  government 
cannot  in  fact  educate  at  all,  but  can  only  educate  some 
by  tmeducating  others.  If,  before  agitating  the  matter, 
men  had  taken  the  precaution  to  define  education,  they 
would  probably  have  seen  that  the  state  can  afford  no 
true  help  in  the  matter.  But  having  unfortunately 
neglected  to  do  this,  they  have  confined  their  attention 
solely  to  the  education  given  at  school,  and  have  forgot 
ten  to  inquire  how  their  plans  bear  upon  the  education 
which  commences  when  school-clays  end.  It  is  not 


386  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

indeed  that  they  do  not  know  this  discipline  of  daily 
duty  to  be  valuable — more  valuable,  in  fact,  than  the 
discipline  of  the  teacher.  You  may  often  hear  them 
remark  as  much.  But,  with  the  eagerness  usual  amongst 
schemers,  they  are  so  absorbed  in  studying  the  action 
of  their  proposed  mechanism  as  to  overlook  its  re 
action. 

Now  of  all  qualities  which  is  the  one  men  most  need  ? 
To  the  absence  of  what  quality  are  popular  distresses 
mainly  attributable  ?  What  is  the  quality  in  which  the 
improvident  masses  are  so  deficient  ?/L  Self-restraint — the 
ability  to  sacrifice  a  small  present  gratification  for  a  pros 
pective  great  one.  74-  labourer  endowed  with  due  self- 
restraint  would  never  spend  his  Saturday-night's  wages 
at  the  public-house.  Had  he  enough  self-restraint,  the 
artisan  would  not  live  up  to  his  income  during  prosperous 
times  and  leave  the  future  unprovided  for.  More  self- 
restraint  would  prevent  imprudent  marriages  and  the 
growth  of  a  pauper  population./  And  were  there  no 
drunkenness,  no  extravagance,  no  reckless  multiplication, 
social  miseries  would  be  trivial. 

Consider  next  how  the  power  of  self-restraint  is  to  be 
increased.  By  a  sharp  experience  alone  can  any  thing  be 
done.  ^Those  in  whom  this  faculty  needs  drawing  out — 
educating  must  be  left  to  the  discipline  of  nature,  and 
allowed  to  bear  the  pains  attendant  on  their  defect  of 
character.  The  only  cure  for  imprudence  is  the  suffering 
which  imprudence  entails.  Nothing  but  bringing  him 
face  to  face  with  stern  necessity,  and  letting  him  feel  how 
unbending,  how  unpitying,  are  her  laws,  can  improve  the 
man  of  ill-governed  desires.  /As  already  shown  (p.  355), 
all  interposing  between  humanity  and  the  conditions  of  its 
existence — cushioning-off  consequences  by  poor-laws  or 
the  like — serves  but  to  neutralize  the  remedy  and  prolong 
the  evil.  Let  us  never  forget  that  the  law  is — adaptation 


CULTUEE   OF   SELF-RESTRAINT.  387 

to  circumstances,  be  they  what  they  may.  And  if,  rather 
than  allow  men  to  come  in  contact  with  the  real  circum 
stances  of  their  position,  we  place  them  in  artificial — in 
false  circumstances,  they  will  adapt  themselves  to  these 
instead ;  and  will,  in  the  end,  have  to  undergo  the  miseries 
of  a  readaptation  to  the  real  ones. 

Of  all  incentives  to  self-restraint,  perhaps  none  is  so 
strong  as  th/6  sense  of  parental  responsibility.*/" And  if  so, 
to  diminish  that  sense  is  to  use  the  most  effectual  means 
of  preventing  self-restraint  from  being  developed.  We 
have  ample  proof  of  this  in  the  encouragement  of  improvi 
dent  marriages  by  a  poor-law ;  and  the  effect  which  a 
poor-law  produces  by  relieving  men  from  the  final  respon 
sibility  of  maintaining  their  children,  must  be  produced  in 
a  smaller  degree  by  taking  away  the  responsibility  of 
educating  their  children.  The  more  the  state  undertakes 
to  do  for  his  family,  the  more  are  the  expenses  of  the 
married  man  reduced,  at  the  cost  of  the  unmarried  man, 
and  the  greater  becomes  the  temptation  to  marry.  Let 
not  any  think  that  the  offer  of  apparently  gratuitous  in 
struction  for  his  offspring  would  be  of  no  weight  with  the 
working  man  deliberating  on  the  propriety  of  taking  a 
wife.  Whoever  has  watched  the  freaks  which  strong 
passion  plays  in  the  councils  of  the  intellect — has  marked 
how  it  will  bully  into  silence  the  weaker  feelings  that 
opposes  it — how  it  will  treat  slightingly  the  most  conclu 
sive  adverse  evidence,  whilst,  in  urging  the  goodness  of 
its  own  cause,  "  trifles  light  as  air  are  confirmations  strong 
as  proofs  of  Holy  Writ " — whoever  has  marked  this,  can 
hardly  doubt  that,  in  the  deliberations  of  such  an  one,  the 
prospect  of  public  training  for  children  would  in  no  small 
degree  affect  the  decision.  Nay,  indeed,  it  would  afford  a 
positive  reason  for  giving  way  to  his  desires.  Just  as  a 
man  at  an  expensive  dinner  will  eat  more  than  he  knows 
is  good  for  him,  on  the  principle  of  having  his  money's 


388  NATIONAL   EDUCATION. 

worth,  so  would  the  artisan  find  one  excuse  for  marrying 
in  the  fact  that,  unless  he  did  so,  he  would  be  paying  edu 
cation-rates  for  nothing. 

Nor  is  it  only  thus  that  a  state-education  would  en 
courage  men  to  obey  present  impulses.  An  influence 
unfavourable  to  the  increase  of  self-control  would  be  exer 
cised  by  it  throughout  the  whole  of  parental  life.  CThat 
powerful  restraint  which  the  anxiety  to  give  children 
schooling  now  imposes  upon  the  improvident  tendencies 
of  the  poor,  would  be  removed.  Many  a  man  who,  as 
things  are,  can  but  just  keep  the  mastery  over  some 
vicious  or  extravagant  propensity,  and  whose  most 
efficient  curb  is  the  thought  that  if  he  gives  way  it  must 
be  at  the  sacrifice  of  that  book-learning  which  he  is  ambi 
tious  to  give  his  family,  would  fall  were  this  curb  weak 
ened — would  not  only  cease  to  improve  in  power  -of  self- 
control  as  he  is  now  doing,  but  would  probably  retrograde, 
and  bequeath  his  offspring  to  a  lower  instead  of  a  higher 
phase  of  civilization.  *J 

Hence,  as  was  said4_a  government  can  educate  in  one 
direction  only  by  wweducating  in  another — can  confer 
knowledge  only  at  the  expense  of  character.  It  retards 
the  development  of  a  quality  universally  needed — one  in 
the  absence  of  which  poverty,  and  recklessness,  and  crime, 
must  ever  continue;  and  all  that  it  may  give  a  smatter 
ing  of  information. 

What  a  contrast  is  there  between  these  futile  contriv-, 
ances  of  men  and  the  admirable,  silent-working  mechan 
isms  of  nature !  Nature,  with  a  perfect  economy,  turns 
all  forces  to  account.  She  makes  action  and  reaction  alike 
useful.  This  strong  affection  for  progeny  becomes  in 
her  hands  the  agent  of  a  double  culture,  serving  at 
once  to  fashion  parent  and  child  into  the  desired  form. 
And  beautiful  is  it  to  see  how  the  most  powerful  of  in 
stincts  is  made  the  means  of  holding  men  under  a  dis- 


UNEDUCATING   INFLUENCE   OF   THE   STATE.  389 

cipline  to  which,  perhaps,  nothing  else  could  make 
them  submit.  Yet  this  skilfully-devised  arrangement 
statesmen  propose  to  dislocate,  confidently  opining  that 
their  own  patent  apparatus  will  answer  a  great  deal 
better ! 

§  11.  Thus,  in  the  present,  as  in  other  cases,  we 
find  the  dictate  of  the  abstract  law  enforced  by  secondary 
considerations.  The  alleged  right  to  education  at  the 
hands  of  the  state  proves  to  be  untenable ;  first,  as  logi 
cally  committing  its  supporters  to  other  claims  too  absurd 
for  consideration ;  and  again,  as  being  incapable  of  defini 
tion.  Moreover,  could  the  claim  be  established,  it  would 
imply  the  duty  of  government  despotically  to  enforce  its 
system  of  discipline,  and  the  duty  of  the  subject  to  submit. 
That  education  ought  not  to  be  dealt  in  after  the  same 
manner  as  other  things,  because  in  its  case  "  the  interest 
and  judgment  of  the  consumer  are  not  sufficient  security 
for  the  goodness  of  the  commodity,"  is  a  plea  with  most 
suspicious  antecedents ;  having  been  many  times  em 
ployed  in  other  instances,  and  many  times  disproved. 
Neither  is  the  implied  assumption  that  the  "  interest  and 
judgment"  of  a  government  would  constitute  a  sufficient 
security  admissible.  On  the  contrary,  experience  proves 
that  the  interests  of  a  government,  and  of  all  the  institu 
tions  it  may  set  up,  are  directly  opposed  to  education  of 
•the  most  important  kind.  Again,  to  say  that  legislative 
teaching  is  needful,  because  other  teaching  has  failed,  pre 
supposes  a  pitiably  narrow  view  of  human  progress ;  and 
further,  involves  the  strange  scepticism  that,  though 
natural  agencies  have  brought  the  enlightenment  of  man 
kind  to  its  present  height,  and  are  even  now  increasing  it 
at  an  unparalleled  rate,  they  will  no  longer  answer.  The 
belief  that  education  is  a  preventive  of  crime,  having  no 
foundation  either  in  theory  or  fact,  cannot  be  held  an 


390  GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

excuse  for  interference.  And,  to  crown  all,  it  turns  out 
that  the  institution  so  much  longed  for  is  a  mere  dead 
machine,  which  can  only  give  out  in  one  form  the 
power  it  absorbs  in  another,  minus  the  friction — a  thing 
which  cannot  stir  toward  effecting  this  kind  of  educa 
tion  without  abstracting  the  force  now  accomplishing  that 
— a  thing,  therefore,  which  cannot  educate  at  all. 


CHAPTER    XXYII. 

GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

§  1.  A  colony  being  a  community,  to  ask  whether 
it  is  right  for  the  state  to  found  a*nd  govern  colonies,  is 
practically  to  ask,  whether  it  is  right  for  one  community 
to  found  and  govern  other  communities.  And  this  ques 
tion  not  being  one  in  which  the  relationships  of  a  society 
to  its  own  authorities  are  alone  involved,  but  being  one 
into  which  there  enter  the  interests  of  parties  external  to 
such  society,  is  in  some  measure  removed  out  of  the  class 
of  questions  hitherto  considered.  Nevertheless,  our  direct 
ing  principle  affords  satisfactory  guidance  in  this  case  as 
well  as  in  the  others. 

That  a  government  cannot  undertake  to  administer 
the  affairs  of  a  colony,  and  to  support  for  it  a  judicial- 
staff,  a  constabulary,  a  garrison,  and  so  forth,  without  tres 
passing  against  the  parent  society,  scarcely  needs  point 
ing  out.  Any  expenditure  for  these  purposes,  be  it  like 
our  own  some  three  and  a  half  millions  sterling  a  year,  or 
but  a  few  thousands,  involves  a  breach  of  state-duty.  The 
taking  from  men  property  beyond  what  is  needful  for  the 
better  securing  of  their  rights,  we  have  seen  to  be  an  in 
fringement  of  their  rights.  Colonial  expenditure  cannot 


THE   GOVERNMENT   OF   COLONIES   UNJUST.  391 

"be  met  without  property  being  sp  taken.  Colonial  expen 
diture  is  therefore  unjustifiable. 

An  objector  might  indeed  allege,  that  by  maintaining 
In  a  settlement  a  subordinate  legislature,  the  parent  legis 
lature  does  but  discharge  toward  the  settlers  its  original 
office  of  protector,  and  that  the  settlers  have  a  claim  to 
protection  at  its  hands.  But  the  duty  of  a  society 
toward  itself,  that  is,  of  a  government  toward  its  sub 
jects,  will  not  permit  the  assumption  of  such  a  responsi 
bility.  /For,  as"  it  is  the  function  of  a  government  to  ad 
minister  the  law  of  equal  freedom,  it  cannot,  without  re 
versing  its  function,  tax  one  portion  of  its  subjects  at  a 
higher  rate  than  is  needful  to  protect  them,  that  it  may 
give  protection  to  another  portion  below  prime  cost ;  and 
to  guard  those  who  emigrate,  at  the  expense  of  those  who 
remain,  is  to  do  this. .  Manifestly,  the  guardianship  which 
a  nation  in  its  corporate  capacity  extends  to  each  of  its 
members,  is  limited  by  conditions.  The  citizen  must 
defray  his  share  of  the  expenses,  must  agree  to  perform 
certain  political  duties,  and  must  reside  within  specified 
geographical  boundaries.  If  he  prefers  to  go  elsewhere, 
it  may  be  presumed  that  he  has  duly  considered,  on  the 
one  hand,  the  benefits  promised  by  his  contemplated  emi 
gration,  and  on  the  other,  the  evils  attending  loss  of  citi 
zenship,  and  that  the  prospective  advantages  of  a  change 
preponderate.  At  any  rate  he  cannot  show  that,  by 
refusing  to  send  out  officers  to  the  antipodes  to  take  care 
of  him^  society  violates  a  recognized  or  implied  con 
tract.  / 

Moreover,  colonial  government,  properly  so  called, 
cannot  be  carried  on  without  transgressing  the  rights  of 
the  colonists.  For  if,  as  generally  happensy  the  colonists 
are  dictated  to  by  authorities  sent  out  from  the  mother 
country,  then  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  broken  in  their 
persons,  as  much  as  by  any  other  kind  of  autocratic  rule. 


392  GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

If,  again,  they  are  allowed  to  administer  thein  own  affairs, 
the  parent  state  retaining  only  a  veto-power,Hhere  is  still 
injustice  in  the  assumption  of  greater  freedom  by  the 
members  of  the  old  community  than  is  conceded  to  those 
of  the  new  one.  /And  if  the  (new  community  is,  as  com 
pletely  self-governed  as  the  old  one,  then,  politically 
speaking,  it  is  not  a  colony  at  all,  but  a  separate  nation." 
In  one  way,  however,  legislative  union  between  a  parent 
state  and  its  colonies  may  be  maintained  without  breach 
of  the  law ;  namely,  by  making  them  integral  parts  of  one 
empire,  severally  represented  in  a  united  assembly  com 
missioned  to  govern  the  whole.  But  theoretically  just  as 
such  an  arrangement  may  be,  and  even  carried  out  though 
it  is  by  France,  it  is  still  too  palpably  impolitic  for  serious 
consideration.  To  propose  that,  whilst  the  English  joined 
in  legislating  for  the  people  of  Australia,  of  the  Cape,  of 
New  Zealand,  of  Canada,  of  Jamaica,  and  of  the  rest,  these 
should  in  turn  legislate  for  the  English,  and  for  each  other, 
is  much  like  proposing  that  the  butcher  should  superin 
tend  the  classification  of  the  draper's  goods,  the  draper 
draw  up  a  tariff  of  prices  for  the  grocer,  and  the  grocer 
instruct  the  baker  in  making  bread. 

Hence,  the  political  union  of  a  parent  state  with  a 
colony  is  inadmissible ;  seeing  that,  as  usually  maintained, 
such  union  necessarily  infringes  the  rights  of  the  mem 
bers  of  both  communities,  and  seeing  that  it  cannot  be 
made  just  without  at  the  same  time  being  made  absurdly 
unfit. 

§  2.  It  was  exceedingly  cool  of  Pope  Alexander  VI. 
to  parcel  out  the  unknown  countries  of  the  Earth  between 
the  Spaniards  and  Portuguese,  granting  to  Spain  all  dis 
covered  and  undiscovered  heathen  lands  lying  west  of  a 
certain  meridian  drawn  through  the  Atlantic,  and  to  Por 
tugal  those  lying  east  of  it.  Queen  Elizabeth,  too,  was 


CKIMES   UNDEK   GUISE    OF    COLONIZATION.  393 

somewhat  cool,  when  she  empowered  Sir  Humphrey  Gil 
bert  "to  discover  and  take  possession  of  remote  and 
heathen  countries,"  and  "  to  exercise  rights,  and  royalties, 
and  jurisdiction,  in  such  countries  and  seas  adjoining." 
Nor  did  Charles  II.  show  less  coolness,  when  he  gave  to 
Winthrop,  Mason,  and  others,  power  to  "  kill,  slay,  and 
destroy,  by  all  fitting  ways,  enterprises,  and  means  whatso 
ever,  all  and  every  such  person  or  persons  as  shall  at  any 
time  hereafter  attempt  or  enterprise  the  destruction,  inva 
sion,  detriment,  or  annoyance  of  the  inhabitants,"  of  the 
proposed  plantation  of  Connecticut.  Indeed,  all  coloniz 
ing  expeditions  down  to  those  of  our  own  day,  with  its 
American  annexations,  its  French  occupations  of  Algiers 
and  Tahiti,  and  its  British  conquests  of  Scinde,  and  of  the 
Punjaub,  have  borne  a  very  repulsive  likeness  to  the 
doings  of  buccaneers.  As  usual,  however,  these  unscru 
pulous  acts  have  brought  deserved  retributions.  Insati 
ate  greediness — a  mere  blind  impulse  to  clutch  whatever 
lies  within  reach — has  generated  very  erroneous  beliefs, 
and  betrayed  nations  into  most  disastrous  deeds.  "  Men 
are  rich  in  proportion  to  their  acres,"  argued  politicians. 
"  An  increase  of  estate  is  manifestly  equivalent  to  an  in 
crease  of  wealth.  What,  then,  can  be  clearer  than  that 
the  acquirement  of  new  territory  must  be  a  national  ad 
vantage  ? "  So,  misled  by  the  analogy,  and  spurred  on 
by  acquisitiveness,  w^e  have  continued  to  seize  province 
after  province,  in  utter  disregard  of  the  losses  uniformly 
entailed  by  them.  In  fact,  it  has  been  inconceivable  that 
they  do  entail  losses.  That  the  addition  of  any  thing 
must  enrich  seems  so  self-evident  a  truth,  that  it  has  never 
struck  men  to  ask  what  happens  when  the  thing  added  is 
a  minus  quantity.  And  even  now,  though  doubt  is 
beginning  to  dawn  upon  the  public  mind,  the  instinctive 
desire  to  keep  hold  is  too  strong  to-  permit  a  change  of 
policy.  Our  predicament  is  like  that  of  the  monkey  in 
17* 


394:  GOVERNMENT    COLONIZATION. 

the  fable,  who,  putting  his  hand  into  ajar  of  fruit,  grasps 
so  large  a  quantity  that  he  cannot  get  his  hand  out  again, 
and  is  obliged  to  drag  the  jar  about  with  him,  never 
thinking  to  let  go  what  he  has  seized.  When  we  shall 
attain  to  something  more  than  the  ape's  wisdom  remains 
to  be  seen.  /Happily  the  old  piratical  spirit  is  on  the  de 
cline.  A  conquest  is  no  longer  gloried  in  as  a  national 
aggrandisement.  Our  last  Indian  annexation  was  lament 
ed  as  an  unfortunate  necessity.  Experience  is  fast  teach 
ing  us  that  distant  dependencies  are  burdens,  and  not 
acquisitions.  And  thus  this  earliest  motive  for  state- 
colonization — the  craving  for  wider  possessions — will  very 
soon  be  destroyed  by  the  conviction  that  territorial  aggres 
sion  is  as  impolitic  as  it  is  unjust.  "7 

§  3.  Whilst  the  mere  propensity  to  thieve — com 
monly  known  under  some  grandiloquent  alias,  disguised  by 
glittering  falsehoods,  and  made  sublime  in  men's  eyes  by 
the  largeness  of  its  aims — has  been  the  real  prompter  of 
colonizing  invasions,  from  those  of  Cortez  and  Pizarro 
downwards,  the  ostensible  purpose  of  them  has  been  either 
the  spread  of  religion  or  the  extension  of  commerce.  In 
modern  days  the  latter  excuse  has  been  the  favourite 
one.  To  obtain  more  markets — this  is  what  people  have 
said  aloud  to  each  other,  was  the  object  aimed  at.  And, 
though  second  to  the  widening  of  empire,  it  has  been  to 
the  compassing  of  this  object  that  colonial  legislation  has 
been  mainly  directed.  Let  us  consider  the  worth  of  such 
legislation. 

Those  holy  men  of  whom  the  middle  ages  were  so  pro 
lific,  seem  to  have  delighted  in  exhibiting  their  super 
natural  powers  on  the  most  trifling  occasions.  It  was  a 
common  feat  with  them,  when  engaged  in  church-building, 
magically  to  lengthen  a  beam  which  the  carpenter  had 
made  too  short.  Some  were  in  the  constant  habit  of  call- 


VAST   MEANS  FOE  ATTAINING   SMALL   ENDS.          395 

ing  down  fire  from  heaven  to  light  their  candles.  When 
at  a  loss  where  to  deposit  his  habiliments,  St.  Goar,  of 
Treves,  would  transform  a  sunbeam  into  a  hat-peg.  And 
it  is  related  of  St.  Columbanus  that  he  wrought  a  miracle 
to  keep  the  grubs  from  his  cabbages.  Now,  although 
these  examples  of  the  use  of  vast  means  for  the  accomplish 
ment  of  insignificant  ends  are  not  quite  paralleled  by  the 
exertions  of  governments  to  secure  colonial  trade,  the 
absurdity  attaching  to  both  differs  only  in  degree.  An 
expenditure  of  power  ridiculously  disproportionate  to 
the  occasion  is  their  common  characteristic.  In  the  one 
case,  as  in  the  other,  an  unnatural  agency  is  employed  to 
effect  what  a  natural  agency  would  effect  as  well.  Trade 
is  a  simple  enough  thing  that  will  grow  up  wherever 
there  is  room  for  it.  But,  according  to  statesmen,  it 
must  be.  created  by  a  gigantic  and  costly  machinery. 
.That  trade  only  is  advantageous  to  a  country  which  brings 
in  return  for  what  is  directly  and  indirectly  given,  a 
greater  worth  of  commodities  than  could  otherwise  be 
obtained^7  But  statesmen  recognize  no  such  limit  to  its 
benefits.  Every  new  outlet  for  English  goods,  kept  open 
at  no  matter  what  cost,  they  think  valuable.  Here  is 
some  scrubby  little  island,  or  wild  territory — unhealthy, 
or  barren,  or  inclement,  or  uninhabited  even — which  by 
right  of  discovery,  conquest,  or  diplomatic  manoeuvring, 
may  be  laid  hands  on.  Possession  is  forthwith  taken ;  a 
high  salaried  governor  is  appointed ;  officials  collect 
round  him ;  then  follow  forts,  garrisons,  guardships ;  from 
these  by-and-bye  come  quarrels  with  neighbouring  peo 
ples,  incursions,  war ;  and  these  again  call  for  more  defen 
sive  works,  more  force,  more  money.  And  to  all  protests 
against  this  reckless  expenditure,  the  reply  is — "  Consider 
how  it  extends  our  commerce."  If  you  grumble  at  the 
sinking  of  £800,000  in  fortifying  Gibraltar  and  Malta,  at 
the  outlay  of  £130,000  a  year  for  the  defence  of  the  Ionian 


396  GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

Islands^at  the  maintenance  of  1,200  soldiers  in  such  a  good- 
for-nothing  place  as  the  Bermudas,  at  the  garrisoning  of 
St.  Helena,  Hong  Kong,  Heligoland,  and  the  rest,  you  are 
told  that  all  this  is  needful  for  the  protection  of  our  com 
merce./^  If  you  object  to  the  expenditure  of  £110,000  per 
annum  on  the  government  of  Ceylon,  it  is  thought  a  suffi 
cient  answer  that  Ceylon  buys  manufactures  from  us  to 
the  gross  value  of  £240,000  yearly.  Any  criticisms  you 
may  pass  upon  the  policy  of  retaining  Canada,  at  an 
annual  cost  of  £800,000,  are  met  by  the  fact  that  this 
amounts  to  only  30  per  cent,  upon  the  sum  which  the 
Canadians"  spend  on  our  goods.*  Should  you,  under  the 
fear  that  the  East  India  Company's  debt  may  some  day 
be  saddled  upon  the  people  of  England,  lament  the  outlay 
of  £17,000,000  over  the  Aifghan  war,  the  sinking  of 
£1,000,000  a  year  in  Scinde,  and  the  swallowing  up  of 
untold  treasure  in  the  subjugation  of  the  Punjaub,  there 
still  comes  the  everlasting  excuse  of  more  trade.  A  Bor- 
nean  jungle,  the  deserts  of  Kanraria,  and  the  desolate  hills 
of  the  Falkland  Islands,  are  all  occupied  upon  this  plea. 
The  most  profuse  expenditure  is  forgiven,  if  but  followed 
by  an  insignificant  demand  for  merchandise  ;  even  though 
such  demand  be  but  for  the  supply  of  a  garrison's  necessi- 
ties»-glass  for  barrack  windows,  starch  for  officers'  shirts, 
and  lump-sugar  for  the  governor's  table — all  of  which  you 
shall  find  carefully  included  in  Board  of  Trade  Tables,  and 
rejoiced  over  as  constituting  an  increase  in  our  exports. 

§  4.  But  not  only  do  we  expend  so  much  to  gain  so 
little,  we  absolutely  expend  it  for  nothing ;  nay,  indeed, 
in  some  cases  to  achieve  a  loss.  All  profitable  trade  with 
colonies  will  come  without  the  outlay  of  a  penny  for  colo 
nial  administration — must  flow  to  us  naturally ;  and  what- 

*  For  these  and  other  such  facts,  see  Sir  W.  Molesworth's  speeches 
delivered  during  the  sessions  of  1848  and  1849. 


EEVENUE   FKOM   COLONIES.  397 

ever  trade  will  not  flow  to  us  naturally,  is  not  profitable, 
but  the  reverse.*^  If  a  given  settlement  deals  solely  with 
us,  it  does  so  from  one  or  two  causes  :  either  we  make  the 
articles  its  inhabitants  consume  at  a  lower  rate  than  any 
other  nation,  or  we  oblige  its  inhabitants  to  buy  those  ar 
ticles  from  us,  though  they  might  obtain  them  for  less 
elsewhere.  Manifestly,  if  we  can  undersell  other  pro 
ducers,  we  should  still  exclusively  supply  its  markets, 
were  the  settlement  independent.  If  we  cannot  undersell 
them,  it  is  equally  certain  that  we  are  indirectly  injuring 
ourselves  and  the  settlers  too^'for,  as  M'Culloch  says: — 
"  Each  country  has  some  natural  or  acquired  capabilities 
that  enable  her  to  carry  on  certain  branches  of  industry 
more  advantageously  than  any  one  else.  But  the  fact  of 
a  country  being  undersold  in  the  markets  of  her  colonies, 
shows  conclusively  that,  instead  of  having  any  superiority, 
she  labours  under  a  disadvantage,  as  compared  with  oth 
ers,  in  the  production  of  the  peculiar  articles  in  demand 
in  them.  And  hence,  in  providing  a  forced  market  in  the 
colonies  for  articles  that  we  should  not  otherwise  be  able 
to  dispose  of,  we  really  engage  a  portion  of  the  capital 
and  labour  of  the  country  in  a  less  advantageous  channel 
than  that  into  which  it  would  naturally  have  flowed." 
And  if  to  the  injury  we  do  ourselves  by  manufacturing 
goods  which  we  could  more  economically  buy,  is  added 
the  injury  we  suffer  in  pacifying  the  colonists,  by  purchas 
ing  from  them  commodities  obtainable  on  better  terms  else 
where,  we  have  before  us  the  twofold  loss  which  these 
much-coveted  monopolies  entail. 

Thus  are  we  again  taught  how  worthy  of  all  reverence 
are  the  injunctions  of  equity,  and  how  universal  is  their 
applicability.  Just  that  commercial  intercourse  with  col 
onies  which  may  be  had  without  breaking  these  injunc 
tions,  brings  gain ;  whilst  just  that  commercial  intercourse 
which  cannot  be  so  had,  brings  loss. 


398  GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

§  5.  Passing  from  home  interests  to  colonial  inter 
ests,  we  still  meet  nothing  but  evil  results.  It  is  a  pret 
tily-sounding  expression  that  of  mother-country  protec 
tion,  but  a  very  delusive  one.  If  we  are  to  believe  those 
who  have  known  the  thing  rather  than  the  name,  there  is 
but  little  of  the  maternal  about  it.  In  the  Declaration  of 
American  Independence  we  have  a  candid  statement  of 
experience  on  this  point.  Speaking  of  the  king — the  per 
sonification  of  the  parent  state,  the  settlers  say : 

"  He  has  obstructed  the  administration  of  justice,  by 
refusing  his  assent  to  laws  for  establishing  judiciary  pow 
ers. 

"  He  has  erected  a  multitude  ofjiew  offices,  and  sent 
hither  swarms  of  officers  to  harass  our  people,  and  eat  out 
their  subsistence. 

"  He  has  kept  among  us  in  times  of  peace  standing 
armies,  without  the  consent  of  our  legislatures. 

"  He  has  combined  with  others  to  subject  us  to  a  ju 
risdiction  foreign  to  our  constitution  and  unacknowledged 
by  our  laws ;  giving  his  assent  to  their  pretended  acts  of 
legislation : — 

"  For  quartering  large  bodies  of  armed  troops  among 
us. 

'^For  protecting  them  by  a  mock  trial  from  punish 
ment  for  any  murders  which  they  should  commit  on  the  in 
habitants  of  these  states. 

"  For  cutting  off  our  trade  with  all  parts  of  the  world. 

"  For  imposing  taxes  upon  us  without  our  consent. 

"  For  depriving  us  in  many  cases  of  the  benefits  of 
trial  by  jury,"  &c.,  &c.,  &c. 

ISTow,  though  tyrannies  so  atrocious  as  these  do  not 
commonly  disgrace  colonial  legislation  in  the  present  day, 
we  have  but  to  glance  over  the  newspapers  published  in 
our  foreign  possessions,  to  see  that  the  arbitrary  rule  of 
the  Colonial  Office  is  no  blessing.  \  Chronic  irritation,  va« 

\ 


COLONIAL   MALADMINISTRATION.  399 

ryiug  in  intensity  from  that  of  which  petitions  are  symp 
tomatic,  to  that  exhibited  in  open  rebellions,  is  habitually 
present  in  these  forty-six  scattered  dependencies  which 
statesmen  have  encumbered  us  with.  Two  outbreaks  in 
fifteen  years  pretty  plainly  hint  the  feeling  of  the  Cana- 
das — a  feeling  still  extant  and  growing,  as  recent  events 
testify.  Within  the  same  period  the  Cape  Boers  have  re 
volted  thrice ;  and  we  have  just  had  a  tumultuous  agita 
tion  and  a  violent  paper  war  about  convicts.  In  the  West 
Indies  there  is  universal  discontent.  Jamaica  advices  tell 
of  stopped  supplies,  and  state-machinery  at  a  dead  lock. 
Guiana  sends  like  news.  Here  are  quarrels  about  retrench 
ment;  there,  insurrectionary  riots;  and  anger  is  every- 
\^here.  The  name  of  Ceylon  calls  to  mind  the  insolence 
of  a  titled  governor  on  the  one  side,  and  on  the  other  the 
bitterness  of  insulted  colonists.  In  the  Australian  settle 
ments,  criminal  immigration  has  been  the  sore  subject ; 
whilst  from  New  Zealand  there  come  protests  against  offi 
cial  despotism.  All  winds  bring  the  same  tale  of  a  negli 
gence  caring  for  no  expostulations,  impertinence  without 
end.  blunderings,  disputes,  delays,  corruption.  Canadians 
complain  of  having  been  induced  by  a  proffered  privilege 
to  sink  their  capital  in  flour-mills,  which  subsequent  legis 
lation  made  useless.  With  an  ever-varying  amount  of 
protection,  sugar-planters  say  they  do  not  know  what  to 
be  at.  South  Africa  bears  witness  to  a  mismanagement 
that  at  one  time  makes  enemies  of  the  Griquas,  and  at 
another  entails  a  Kaffir  war.  The  emigrants  of  New  Zea 
land  lament  over  a  seat  of  government  absurdly  chosen, 
money  thrown  away  upon  useless  roads,  and  needful 
works  left  undone.  South  Australia  is  made  bankrupt  by 
its  governor's  extravagance ;  lands  are  apportioned  so  as 
to  barbarize  the  settlers  by  dispersion,  and  labourers  are 
sent  out  in  excess,  and  left  to  b.eg.  Our  Chinese  trade 
gets  endangered  by  the  insulting  behaviour  of  military 


400  GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

officers  to  the  natives ;  and  the  authorities  of  Labuan  make 
their  first  settlement  in  a  pestilential  swamp. 

Nevertheless,  these  odd  results  of  mother-country  pro 
tection  need  not  surprise  us,  if  we  consider  by  Avhom  the 
duties  of  maternity  are  discharged.  Dotted  here  and 
there  over  the  earth,  at  distances  varying  from  one  thou 
sand  to  fourteen  thousand  miles,  and  to  and  from  some  of 
which  it  takes  three-quarters  of  a  year  to  send  a  question 
and  get  back  an  answer,  are  forty-six  communities,  con 
sisting  of  different  races,  placed  in  different  circumstances. 
And  the  affairs  of  these  numerous,  far-removed  communi 
ties — their  commercial,  social,  political,  and  religious  in 
terests,  are  to  be  cared  for — by  whom?  By  six  func 
tionaries  and  their  twenty-three  clerks,  sitting  at  desks  in 
Downing  Street !  being  at  the  rate  of  0'13  of  a  function 
ary  and  half  a  clerk  to  each  settlement'!  ,  , 

Is  it  not,  then,  sufficiently  clear  that  this  state-coloni 
zation  is  as  indefensible  on  the  score  of  colonial  welfare, 
as  on  that  of  home  interests  ?  May  we  not  reasonably 
doubt  the  propriety  of  people  on  one  side  of  the  earth 
being  governed  by  officials  on  the  other?  Would  not 
these  transplanted  societies  probably  manage  their  affairs 
better  than  we  can  do  it  for  them  ?  At  any  rate  our  be 
nevolent  anxiety  on  their  behalf  may  be  at  rest,  should  it 
turn  out  that  they  would  willingly  dispense  with  our  su 
perintendence.  All  that  the  most  romantic  generosity 
can  require  from  us,  is  the  tender  of  our  good  offices ;  and 
should  these  be  declined,  our  consciences  may  feel  fully 
discharged  of  any  assumed  duty.  Now  on  polling  the 
inhabitants  of  each  colony  on  the  question  whether  Eng 
land  should  continue  legislating  for  them  or  not,  we  should 
be  pretty  certain  to  get  the  answer  that,  were  it  the  same 
thing  to  us,  they  would  much  rather  legislate  for  them 
selves. 


EFFECT  UPON  THE  ABORIGINES.          401 

§  6.  .Great,  however,  as  are  the  evils  entailed  by 
government  colonization  upon  both  parent  state  and  set 
tlers,  they  look  insignificant  when  compared  with  those  it 
inflicts  upon  the  aborigines  of  the  conquered  countries//' 
The  people  of  Java  believe  that  the  souls  of  Europeans 
pass  at  death  into  the  bodies  of  tigers ;  and  it  is  related 
of  a  Hispanolian  chief  that  he  hoped  not  to  go  to  heaven 
when  he  heard  there  were  Spaniards  there.  Significant 
facts  these :  darkly  suggestive  of  many  an  unrecorded 
horror.  But  they  hint  nothing  worse  than  history  tells  of. 
Whether  we  think  of  the  extinct  West-Indian  tribes,  who 
were  worked  to  death  in  mines ;  or  of  the  Cape  Hotten 
tots,  whose  masters  punished  them  by  shooting  small  shot 
into  their  legs ;  or  of  those  nine  thousand  Chinese  whom 
the  Dutch  massacred  one  morning  in  Batavia ;  or  of  the 
Arabs  lately  suffocated  in  the  caves  of  Dahra  by  the 
French,  we  do  but  call  to  mind  solitary  samples  of  the 
treatment  commonly  received  by  subjugated  races  from  so- 
called  Christian  nations.  Should  any  one  flatter  himself 
that  we  English  are  guiltless  of  such  barbarities,  he  may 
soon  be  shamed  by  a  narrative  of  our  doings  in  the  East. 
The  Anglo-Indians  of  the  last  century — "  birds  of  prey 
and  of  passage,"  as  they  were  styled  by  Burke — showed 
themselves  only  a  shade  less  cruel  than  their  prototypes 
of  Peru  and  Mexico.  Imagine  how  black  must  have  been 
their  deeds,  when  even  the  Directors  of  the  Company  ad 
mitted  that  "  the  vast  fortunes  acquired  in  the  inland  trade 
have  been  obtained  by  a  scene  of  the  most  tyrannical  and 
oppressive  conduct  that  was  ever  known  in  any  age  or 
country."  Conceive  the  atrocious  state  of  society  de 
scribed  by  Vansittart,  who  tells  us  that  the  English  com 
pelled  the  natives  to  buy  or  sell  at  just  what  rates  they 
pleased,  on  pain  of  flogging  or  confinement.  Judge  to 
what  a  pass  things  must  have  come  when,  in  describing  a 
journey,  Warren  Hastings  says,  "most  of  the  petty  towns 


4:02  GOVERNMENT  COLONIZATION. 

and  serais  were  deserted  at  our  approach."  A  cold 
blooded  treachery  was  the  established  policy  of  the  au 
thorities.  Princes  were  betrayed  into  Avar  with  each 
other ;  and  one  of  them  having  been  helped  to  overcome 
his  antagonist,  was  then  himself  dethroned  for  some  al 
leged  misdemeanour.  Always  some  muddied  stream  was 
at  hand  as  a  pretext  for  official  wolves.  Dependent  chiefs 
holding  coveted  lands  were  impoverished  by  exorbitant 
demands  for  tribute ;  and  their  ultimate  inability  to  meet 
these  demands  was  construed  into  a  treasonable  offence, 
punished  by  deposition?  Even  down  to  our  own  day 
kindred  iniquities  are  continued.*  Down  to  our  own  day, 
too,  are  continued  the  grievous  salt  monopoly,  and  the 
pitiless  taxation  that  wrings  from  the  poor  ryots  nearly 
half  the  produce  of  the  soil.  ^  Down  to  our  own  day  con 
tinues  the  cunning  despotism  which  uses  native  soldiers 
to  maintain  and  extend  native  subjection — a  despotism 
under  which,  not  many  years  since,  a  regiment  of  sepoys 
was  deliberately  massacred,  for  refusing  to  march  without 
proper  clothing.  Down  to  our  own  day  the  police  author 
ities  league  with  wealthy  scamps,  and  allow  the  machinery 
of  the  law  to  be  used  for  purposes  of  extortion.  Down 
to  our  own  day,  so-called  gentlemen  will  ride  their  ele 
phants  through  the  crops  of  impoverished  peasants ;  and 
will  supply  themselves  with  provisions  from  the  native 
villages  without  paying  for  them.  And  down  to  our  own 
day,  it  is  common  with  the  people  in  the  interior  to  run 
into  the  woods  at  sight  of  a  European ! 

No  one  can  fail  to  see  that  these  cruelties,  these  treach 
eries,  these  deeds  of  blood  and  rapine,  for  which  European 
nations  in  general  have  to  blush,  are  mainly  due  to  the 
carrying  on  of  colonization  under  state-management,  and 
with  the  help  of  state-funds  and  state-force.  It  is  quite 
needless  to  point  to  the  recent  affair  at  Wairau  in  New 
*  See  Sir  Alexander  Burns'  despatches. 


CRUELTY   TO   THE   ABOEIGINES.  .       403 

Zealand,  or  to  the  Kaffir  war,  or  to  our  perpetual  aggres 
sions  in  the  East,  or  to  colonial  history  at  large,  in  proof 
of  this,  for  the  fact  is  self-evident.  A  schoolboy,  made 
overbearing  by  the  consciousness  that  there  is  always  a 
big  brother  to  take  his  part,  typifies  the  colonist,  who  sees 
in  his  mother-country  a  bully  ever  ready  to  back  and  de 
fend  him:*  Unprotected  emigrants,  landing  amongst  a 
strange  race,  and  feeling  themselves  the  weaker  party,  are 
tolerably  certain  to  behave  well,  and  a  community  of  them 
is  likely  to  grow  up  in  amicable  relationship  with  the  na 
tives.  But  let  these  emigrants  be  followed  by  regiments 
of  soldiers  —  let  them  have  a  fort  built,  and  cannons  mount 
ed  —  let  them  feel  that  they  have  the  upper  hand,  and  they 
will  no  longer  be  the  same  men.  A  brutality  will  come 
out,  which  the  discipline  of  civilized  life  had  kept  under  ; 
and  not  unfrequently  they  will  prove  more  vicious  than 
they  even  knew  themselves  to  be.  Various  evil  influences 
conspire  with  their  own  bad  propensities.  The  military 
force  guarding  them  has  a  strong  motive  to  foment  quar 
rels  ;  for  war  promises  prize-money.  /  To  the  civil  em 
ployes,  conquest  holds  out  a  prospect  of  more  berths  and 
quicker  promotion  —  a  fact  which  must  bias  them  in  favour 
of  it.^  Thus  an  aggressive  tendency  is  encouraged  in  all  — 
a  tendency  which  is  sure  to  show  itself  in  acts,  and  to  be 
tray  the  colonists  into  some  of  those  atrocities  that  dis 
grace  civilization. 

§  7.  As  though  to  round  off  the  argument  more 
completely,  history  presents  us  with  proof  that  whilst 
government  colonization  is  accompanied  by  endless  miser 
ies  and  abominations,  colonization  naturally  carried  on  is 
free  from  these.  Notwithstanding  the  misconduct  he  is 
accused  of,  to  William  Penn  belongs  the  honour  of  having 
shown  men  that  the  kindness,  justice,  and  truth  of  its  in 
habitants,  are  better  safeguards  to  a  colony  than  troops 


4:04  GOVERNMENT   COLONIZATION. 

and  fortifications  and  the  bravery  of  governors.  In  all 
points  Pennsylvania  illustrates  the  equitable,  as  contrasted 
with  the  inequitable,  mode  of  colonizing.  It  was  founded 
not  by  the  state,  but  by  private  individuals.  It  needed 
no  mother-country  protection,  for  it  committed  no  breaches 
of  the  moral  law.  Its  treaty  with  the  Indians,  described 
as  "  the  only  one  ever  concluded  which  was  not  ratified 
by  an  oath,  and  the  only  one  that  was  never  broken," 
served  it  in  better  stead  than  any  garrison.  For  the  sev 
enty  years  during  which  the  Quakers  retained  the  chief 
power,  it  enjoyed  an  immunity  from  that  border  warfare, 
with  its  concomitant  losses,  and  fears,  and  bloodshed,  to 
which  other  settlements  were  subject.  On  the  other  hand, 
its  people  maintained  a  friendly  and  mutually-beneficial 
intercourse  with  the  natives ;  and,  as  a  natural  conse 
quence  of  complete  security,  made  unusually  rapid  pro 
gress  in  material  prosperity.^ 

That  a  like  policy  would  have  been  similarly  advanta 
geous  in  other  cases,  may  reasonably  be  inferred.  I  No  one 
can  doubt,  for  instance, -that  had  the  East  India  Company 
been  denied  military  aid  and  state-conferred  privileges, 
both  its  own  affairs,  and  the  affairs  of  Hindostan,  would 
have  been  in  a  far  better  condition  than  they  now  are. 
Insane  longing  for  empire  would  never  have  burdened  the 
Company  with  the  enormous  debt  which  at  present  para 
lyzes  it.  The  energy  that  has  been  expended  in  aggres 
sive  wars  would  have  been  employed  in  developing  the 
resources  of  the  country.  Unenervated  by  monopolies, 
trade  would  have  been  much  more  successful.  The  native 
rulers,  influenced  by  a  superior  race  on  friendly  terms 
with  them,  would  have  facilitated  improvements ;  and  we 
should  not  have  seen,  as  now,  rivers  unnavigated,  roads 
not  bridged  or  metalled,  and  the  proved  capabilities  of 
the  soil  neglected.  Private  enterprise  would  long  ago 
have  opened  up  these  sources  of  wealth,  as  in  fact  it  is  at 


ITS    ENTIRE   IMPOLICY.  405 

length  doing,  in  spite  of  the  discouragements  thrown  in 
its  way  by  conquest-loving  authorities.  And  had  the  set. 
tiers  thus  turned  their  attention  wholly  to  the  develop 
ment  of  commerce,  and  conducted  themselves  peaceably, 
as  their  defenceless  state  would  have  compelled  them  to 
do,  England  would  have  been  better  supplied  with  raw 
materials,  the  markets  for  her  goods  would  have  enlarged, 
and  something  appreciable  toward  the  civilization  of  the 
East  would  have  been  accomplished. 

§  8.  In  many  ways,  then,  does  experience  enforce 
the  verdict  pronounced  by  the  law  of  state-duty  against 
state-colonization.  It  turns  out  that  extension  of  empire 
is  not  synonymous  with  increase  of  wealth ;  but  that,  on 
the  contrary,  aggressions  bred  of  the  desire  for  territorial 
gain,  entail  loss.  The  notion  that  we  secure  commercial 
benefits  by  legislative  connection  with  colonies,  is  a  proved 
delusion.  At  best  we  throw  away  the  whole  sum  which 
colonial  government  costs  us ;  whilst  we  may,  and  often 
do,  incur  further  loss,  by  establishing  an  artificial  trade. 
The  plea  for  protection  to  the  settlers  must  be  abandoned ; 
seeing  that  this  so-called  protection  is  in  practice  oppres 
sion  ;  and  seeing  that  the  settlers,  from  whose  judgment 
on  the  matter  there  is  no  appeal,  hint  very  plainly  their 
wish  to  dispense  with  it.  As  for  the  aborigines,  it  is  man 
ifest  that  the  cruelties  inflicted  on  them  have  been  mainly 
due  to  the  backing  of  emigrants  by  the  parent  state. 
And,  lastly,  we  have  conclusive  proof  not  only  that  vol 
untary  colonization  is  practicable,  but  that  it  is  free  from 
those  many  evils  attendant  upon  colonization  managed  by 
a  government. 


406  SANITARY   SUPERVISION. 


CHAPTEE    XXYIII. 

SANITAEY     SUPERVISION. 

§  1.  The  current  ideas  respecting  legislative  inter 
ference  in  sanitary  matters  do  not  seem  to  have  taken  the 
form  of  a  definite  theory.  The  Eastern  Medical  Associa 
tion  of  Scotland  does  indeed  hold  "  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the 
state  to  adopt  measures  for  protecting  the  health  as  weft 
as  the  property  of  its  subjects ; "  and  the  Times  lately 
asserted  that  "  the  Privy  Council  is  chargeable  with  the 
health  of  the  Empire ; "  *  but  no  considerable  political 
party  has  adopted  either  of  these  dogmas  by  way  of  a  dis 
tinct  confession  of  faith.  Nevertheless,  the  opinions  that 
widely  prevail  on  questions  of  sewage,  water-supply,  ven 
tilation,  and  the  like,  fully  commit  their  advocates  to  the 
belief  these  dogmas  embody. 

That  it  comes  within  the  proper  sphere  of  government 
to  repress  nuisances  is  evident.  /  He  who  contaminates  the 
atmosphere  breathed  by  his  neighbour,  is  infringing  his 
neighbour's  rights.  Men  having  equal  claims  to  the  free 
use  of  the  elements — having  faculties  which  need  this 
free  use  of  the  elements  for  their  due  exercise — and  hav 
ing  that  exercise  more  or  less  limited  by  whatever  makes 
the  elements  more  or  less  unusable,  are  obviously  tres 
passed  against  by  any  one  who  unnecessarily  vitiates 
the  elements,  and  renders  them  detrimental  to  health, 
or  disagreeable  to  the  senses ;  and  in  the  discharge  of 
its  function  as  protector,  a  government  is  obviously 
called  upon  to  afford  redress  to  those  so  trespassed 
against. 

Beyond  this,  however,  it   cannot   lawfully  go.      As 

*  See  Times,  Oct.  17,  1848. 


A   VIOLATION   OF   EIGHTS.  407 

already  shown  in  several  kindred  cases,  fora  government  to 
take  from  a  citizen  more  property  than  is  needful  for  the 
efficient  defence  of  that  citizen's  rights,  is  to  infringe  his 
rights — is,  consequently,  to  do  the  opposite  of  what  it,  the 
government,  is  commissioned  to  do  for  him — or,  in  other 
words,  is  to  do  wrong.  And  hence  all  taxation  for  sani 
tary  superintendence  coming,  as  it  does,  within  this  cate 
gory,  must  be  condemned. 

§  2.  This  theory,  of  which  Boards  of  Health  and 
the  like  are  embodiments,  is  no  only  inconsistent  with  our 
definition  of  state-duty,  but  is  further  open  to  strictures, 
similar  to,  and  equally  fatal  with,  those  made  in  analogous 
cases.  If  by  saying  "  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  state  to 
adopt  measures  for  protecting  the  health  of  its  subjects," 
it  is  meant  (as  it  is  meant  by  the  majority  of  the  medical 
profession)  that  the  state  should  interpose  between  quacks 
and  those  who  patronize  theni/or  between  the  druggist  and 
the  artisan  who  wants  a  remedy  for  his  cold — if  it  is  meant 
that  to  guard  people  against  empirical  treatment,  the  state 
should  forbid  all  unlicensed  persons  from  prescribing — 
then  the  reply  is,  that  to  do  so  is  directly  to  violate  the 
moral  law.  Men's  rights  are  infringed  by  these,  as  much 
as  by  all  other  trade  interferences./  The  invalid  is  at  lib 
erty  to  buy  medicine  and  advice  from  whomsoever  he 
pleases;  the  unlicensed  practitioner  is  at  liberty  to  sell 
these  to  whomsoever  will  buy.  On  no  pretext  whatever 
can  a  barrier  be  set  up  between  them,  without  the  law  of 
equal  freedom  being  broken ;  and  least  of  all  may  the  gov 
ernment,  Avhose  office  it  is  to  uphold  that  law,  become  a 
transgressor  of  it. 

Moreover  this  doctrine,  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  state 
to  protect  the  health  of  its  subjects,  cannot  be  established, 
for  the  same  reason  that  its  kindred  doctrines  cannot, 
namely,  the  impossibility  of  saying  how  far  the  alleged 


408  SANITARY   SUPERVISION. 


"^ 


duty  shall  he  carried  out.  Health  depends  upon  the  ful 
filment  of  numerous  conditions — can  be  "protected"  only 
by  ensuring  that  fulfilment :  if,  therefore,  it  is  the  duty  of 
the  state  to  protect  the  health  of  its  subjects,  it  is  its  duty 
to  see  that  all  the  conditions  of  health  are  fulfilled  by 
them.  /  Shall  this  duty  be  consistently  discharged  ?  If  so, 
the  legislature  must  enact  a  national  dietary ;  prescribe  so 
many  meals  a  day  for  each  individual ;  fix  the  quantities 
and  qualities  of  food,  both  for  men  and  women ;  state  the 
proportion  of  fluids,  when  to  be  taken,  and  of  what  kind ; 
specify  the  amount  of  exercise,  and  define  its  character ; 
describe  the  clothing  to  be  employed;  determine  the 
hours  of  sleep,  allowing  for  the  difference  of  age  and  sex : 
and  so  on  with  all  other  particulars,  necessary  to  complete 
a  perfect  synopsis,  for  the  daily  guidance  of  the  nation : 
and'  to  enforce  these  regulations  it  must  employ  a  suffi 
ciency  of  duly-qualified  officials,  empowered  to  direct 
every  one's  domestic  arrangements.  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  a  universal  supervision  of  private  conduct  is  not 
meant,  then  there  comes  the  question — Where,  between 
this  and  no  supervision  at  all,  lies  the  boundary  up  to 
which  supervision  is  a  duty  ?  To  which  question  no 
answer  can  be  given. 

'A'^S;MA  Jy^v^-vp^: 

§  3.  There  is  a  manifest  analogy  between  commit 
ting  to  government-guardianship  the  physical  health  of  the 
people,  and  committing  to  it  their  moral  health.  The  two 
proceedings  are  equally  reasonable,  may  be  defended  by 
similar  arguments,  and  must  stand  or  fall  together.  If 
the  welfare  of  men's  souls  can  be  fitly  dealt  with  by  acts 
of  parliament,  why  then  the  welfare  of  their  bodies  can  be 
fitly  dealt  with  likewise.  He  who  thinks  the  state  com 
missioned  to  administer  spiritual  remedies,  may  consist 
ently  think  that  it  should  administer  material  ones.  The 
disinfecting  society  from  vice  may  naturally  be  quoted  as 


f 


STATE-MEDICINE.  409 


a  precedent  for  disinfecting  it  from  pestilence.  Purifying 
the  haunts  of  men  from  noxious  vapours  may  be  held  quite 
as  legitimate  as  purifying  their  moral  atmosphere.  The 
fear  that  false  doctrines  may  be  instilled  by  unauthor 
ized  preachers,  has  its  analogue  in  the  fear  that  unauthor 
ized  practitioners  may  give  deleterious  medicines  or  ad 
vice.  And  the  persecutions  once  committed  to  prevent 
the  one  evil,  countenance  the  penalties  used  to  put  down 
the  other.  Contrariwise,  the  arguments  employed  by 
the  dissenter  to  show  that  the  moral  sanity  of  the  people 
is  not  a  matter  for  state  superintendence,  are  applica 
ble,  with  a  slight  change  of  terms,  to  their  physical  sanity 
also. 

Let  no  one  think  this  analogy  imaginary.  The  two 
notions  are  not  only  theoretically  related  ;  we  have  facts 
proving  that  they  tend  to  embody  themselves  in  similar 
institutions.  There  is  an  evident  inclination  on  the  part 
of  the  medical  profession  to  get  itself  organized  after  the 
fashion  of  the  clerisy.  Moved  as  are  the  projectors  of  a 
railway,  who,  whilst  secretly  hoping  for  salaries,  persuade 
themselves  and  others  that  the  proposed  railway  will  be 
beneficial  to  the  public  —  moved  as  all  men  are  under  such 
circumstances,  by  nine  parts  of  self-interest  gilt  over  with 
one  part  of  philanthropy  —  surgeons  and  physicians  are 
vigorously  striving  to  erect  a  medical  establishment  akin 
to  our  religious  one.  Little  do  the  public  at  large  know 
how  actively  professional  publications  are  agitating  for 
state-appointed  overseers  of  the  public  health.  Take  up 
the  Lancet,  and  you  shall  find  articles  written  to  show 
the  necessity  of  making  poor-law  medical  officers  inde 
pendent  of  Boards  of  Guardians  by  appointing  them  for 
life,  holding  them  responsible  only  to  central  authority, 
and  giving  them  handsome  salaries  from  the  Consolidated 
Fund.  The  Journal  of  Public  Health  proposes  that 
"  every  house  on  becoming  vacant  be  examined  by  a  com- 
18 


410  SANITARY    SUPERVISION. 

petent  person  as  to  its  being  in  a  condition  adapted  for  the 
safe  dwelling  in  of  the  future  tenants ; "  and  to  this  end 
would  raise  by  fees,  chargeable  on  the  landlords,  "  a  reve 
nue  adequate  to  pay  a  sufficient  staff  of  inspectors  four  or 
five  hundred  pounds  a  year  each."  A  non-professional 
publication,  echoing  the  appeal,  says — "No  reasonable 
man  can  doubt  that  if  a  proper  system  of  ventilation  were 
rendered  imperative  upon  landlords,  not  only  would  the 
cholera  and  other  epidemic  diseases  be  checked,  but  the 
general  standard  of  health  would  be  raised."  Whilst  the 
Medical  Times  shows  its  leanings,  by  announcing,  with 
marked  approbation,  that  "  the  Ottoman  government  has 
recently  published  a  decree  for  the  appointment  of  physi 
cians  to  be  paid  by  the  state,"  who  "  are  bound  to  treat 
gratuitously  all — both  rich  and  poor — who  shall  demand 
advice."  y 

More  or  less  distinctly  expressed  in  these  passages 
there  is  an<tmmistakable  wish  to  establish  an  organized, 
tax-supported  class,  charged  with  the  health  of  men's 
bodies,  as  the  clergy  are  charged  with  the  health  of  their 
souls.  And  whoever  has  watched  how  institutions  grow — 
how  by  little  and  little  a  very  innocent-looking  infancy  un 
folds  into  a  formidable  maturity,  with  vested  interests,  po 
litical  influence,  and  a  strong  instinct  of  self-preservation, 
will  see  that  the  germs  here  peeping  forth  are  quite  capa 
ble,  under  favourable  circumstances,  of  developing  into 
such  an  organization.  He  will  see  further,  that  favourable 
circumstances  are  not  wanting — that  the  prevalance  of  un 
employed  professional  men,  with  whom  these  proposals  for 
sanitary  inspectors  and  public  surgeons  mostly  originate, 
is  likely  to  continue ;  and  that  continuing,  it  will  tend  to 
multiply  the  offices  it  has  created,  much  in  the  same  way 
that  the  superabundance  of  clergy  multiplies  churches. 
He  will  even  anticipate  that,  as  the  spread  of  education 
is  certain  to  render  the  pressure  "Trpon  the  intellectual 


GROWTH   OF   MEDICAL   ESTABLISHMENTS.  411 

labour-market  still  more  intense  than  it  now  is,  there 
will  by-and-by  be  a  yet  greater  stimulus  to  the  manufac 
ture  of  berths — a  yet  greater  tendency  on  the  part  of  all 
who  want  genteel  occupations  for  their  sons,  to  counte 
nance  this  manufacture — and,  therefore,  a  yet  greater 
danger  of  the  growth  of  a  medical  establishment. 

§  4.  The  most  specious  excuse  for  not  extending  to 
medical  advice  the  principles  of  free-trade,  is  the  same  as 
that  given  for  not  leaving  education  to  be  diffused  under 
them ;  namely,  that  the  judgment  of  the  consumer  is  not 
a  sufficient  guarantee  for  the  goodness  of  the  commodity, 
he  intolerance  shown  by  orthodox  surgeons  and  physi 
cians,  toward  unordained  followers  of  their  calling,  is  to 
be  understood  as  arising  from  a  desire  to  defend  the  public 
against  quackery.  Ignorant  people  say  they  cannot  dis 
tinguish  good  treatment  from  bad,  or  skilful  advisers  from 
unskilful  ones :  hence  it  is  needful  that  the  choice  should 
be  made  for  them.  And  then,  following  in  the  track  of 
priesthoods,  for  whose  persecutions  a  similar  defence  has 
always  been  set  up,  they  agitate  for  more  stringent  regula 
tions  against  unlicensed  practitioners,  and  descant  upon 
the  dangers  to  which  men  are  exposed  by  an  unrestricted 
system.  Hear  Mr.  Wakley.  Speaking  of  a  recently- 
revived  law  relating  to  chemists  and  druggists,  he  says, 
"  It  must  have  the  effect  of  checking,  to  a  vast  extent, 
that  frightful  evil  called  counter  practice,  exercised  by 
unqualified  persons,  which  has  so  long  been  a  disgrace  to 
the  operation  of  the  laws  relating  to  medicine  in  this  coun 
try,  and  which,  doubtless,  has  been  attended  with  a  dread 
ful  sacrifice  of  human  life."  (Lancet^  Sept.  11,  1841.) 
And  again,  "  There  is  not  a  chemist  and  druggist  in  the 
empire  who  would  refuse  to  prescribe  in  his  own  shop  in 
medical  cases,  or  who  would  hesitate  day  by  day  to  pre 
scribe  simple  remedies  for  the  ailments  of  infants  and 


412  SANITARY   SUPERVISION. 

children."  *  *  *  *  "  We  had  previously  considered 
the  evil  to  be  of  enormous  magnitude,  but  it  is  quite 
clear  that  we  had  under-estimated  the  extent  of  the 
danger  to  which  the  public  are  exposed."  (Lancet,  Oct. 
16,  1841.) 

Any  one  may  discern  through  these  ludicrous  exag 
gerations  much  more  of  the  partisan  than  of  the  philan 
thropist.  But  let  that  pass.  And  without  dwelling  upon 
the  fact,  that  it  is  strange  a  "  dreadful  sacrifice  of  human 
life  "  should  not  have  drawn  the  attention  of  the  people 
themselves  to  this  "  frightful  evil " — without  doing  more 
than  glance  at  the  further  fact,  that  nothing  is  said  of 
those  benefits  conferred  by  "  counter  practice,"  which 
would  at  least  form  a  considerable  set-off  against  this 
"  evil  of  enormous  magnitude  " — let  it  be  conceded  that 
very  many  of  the  poorer  classes  are  injured  by  druggists' 
prescriptions  and  quack  medicines.  The  allegation  hav 
ing  been  thus,  for  argument's  sake,  admitted  in  full,  let  us 
now  consider  whether  it  constitutes  a  sufficient  plea  for 
legal  interference. 

Inconvenience,  suffering,  and  death,  are  the  penalties 
attached  by  nature  to  ignorance,  as  well  as  to  incompe 
tence — are  also  the  means  of  remedying  these.  And 
whoso  thinks  he  can  mend  matters  by  dissociating  igno 
rance  and  its  penalties,  lays  claim  to  more  than  Divine 
wisdom,  and  more  than  Divine  benevolence.  If  there 
seems  harshness  in  those  ordinations  of  things,  which, 
with  unfaltering  firmness,  punish  every  breach  of  law — if 
there  seems  harshness  in  those  ordinations  of  things  which 
visit  a  slip  of  the  foot  with  a  broken  limb — which  send 
lingering  agonies  to  follow  the  inadvertent  swallowing  of 
a  noxious  herb — which  go  on  quietly,  age  after  age,  giv 
ing  fevers  and  agues  to  dwellers  in  marshes — and  which, 
now  and  then,  sweep  away  by  pestilence  tens  of  thousands 
of  unhealthy  livers — if  there  seems  harshness  in  such 


WISE   SEVERITY    OF   NATURE'S   DISCIPLINE.  413 

ordinations,  be  sure  it  is  apparent  only,  and  not  real. 
Partly  by  weeding  out  those  of  lowest  development,  and 
partly  by  subjecting  those  who  remain  to  the  never-ceas 
ing  discipline  of  experience,  nature  secures  the  growth  of 
a  race  who  shall  both  understand  the  conditions  of  exist 
ence,  and  be  able  to  act  up  to  them.  It  is  impossible  in 
any  degree  to  suspend  this  discipline  by  stepping  in  be 
tween  ignorance  and  its  consequences,  without,  to  a  cor 
responding  degree,  suspending  the  progress.  If  to  be  ig 
norant  were  as  safe  as  to  be  wise,  no  one  would  become 
wise.  And  all  measures  which  tend  to  put  ignorance 
upon  a  par  with  wisdom,  inevitably  check  the  growth  of 
wisdom.  Acts  of  parliament  to  save  silly  people  from  the 
evils  which  putting  faith  in  empirics  may  entail  upon  them, 
do  this,  and  are  therefore  bad. '  TJnpitifying  as  it  looks,  it 
is  best  to  let  the  foolish  man  suffer  the  appointed  penalty 
of  his  foolishness.  For  the  pain — he  must  bear  it  as  well 
as  he  can :  for  the  experience — he  must  treasure  it  up,  and 
act  more  rationally  in  future.  To  others  as  well  as  to 
himself  will  his  case  be  a  warning.  And  by  multiplica 
tion  of  such  warnings,  there  cannot  fail  to  be  generated 
in  all  men  a  caution  corresponding  to  the  danger  to  be 
shunned.  Are  there  any  who  desire  to  facilitate  the  pro 
cess  ?  Let  them  dispel  error ;  and,  provided  they  do  this 
in  a  legitimate  way,  the  faster  they  do  it  the  better.  But 
to  guard  ignorant  men  against  the  evils  of  their  igno 
rance — to  divorce  a  cause  and  consequence  which  God  has 
joined  together — to  render  needless  the  intellect  put  into 
us  for  our  guidance — to  unhinge  what  is,  in  fact,  the  very 
mechanism  of  existence — must  necessarily  entail  nothing 
but  disasters. 

Who,  indeed,  after  pulling  off  the  coloured  glasses  of 
prejudice,  and  thrusting  out  of  sight  his  pet  projects,  can 
help  seeing  the  folly  of  these  endeavours  to  protect  men 
against  themselves  ?  A  sad  population  of  imbeciles  would 

iri^h  fafk*   wirvcZSr* /^ci  frt 

>   /  '     t.  K  /        >  I     • 

:• .  +*  ' 


SANITARY    SUPERVISION. 

our  schemers  fill  the  world  with,  could  their  plans  last.  A 
sorry  kind  of  human  constitution  would  they  make  for  us — 
a  constitution  lacking  the  power  to  uphold  itself,  and  re 
quiring  to  be  kept  alive  by  superintendence  from  with 
out — a  constitution  continually  going  wrong,  and  needing 
to  be  set  right  again — a  constitution  even  tending  to  self- 
destruction.  Why  the  whole  effort  of  nature  is  to  get  rid 
of  such  to  clear  the  world  of  them,  and  make  room  for  bet 
ter.  Nature  demands  that  every  being  shall  be  self-suf 
ficing.  All  that  are  not  so,  nature  is  perpetually  with 
drawing  by  death.  Intelligence  sufficient  to  avoid  dan 
ger,  power  enough  to  fulfil  every  condition,  ability  to 
cope  with  the  necessities  of  existence — these  are  qualifica 
tions  invariably  insisted  on.  Mark  how  the  diseased  are 
dealt  with.  </  Consumptive  patients,  with  lungs  incompe 
tent  to  perform  the  duties  of  lungs,  people  with  assimi 
lative  organs  that  will  not  take  up  enough  nutriment, 
people  with  defective  hearts  that  break  down  under  ex 
citement  of  the  circulation,  people  with  any  constitutional 
flaw  preventing  the  due  fulfilment  of  the  conditions  of  life, 
are  continually  dying  out,  and  leaving  behind  those  fit  for 
the  climate,  food,  and  habits  to  which  they  are  born. 
Even  the  less-imperfectly  organized,  who,  under  ordinary 
circumstances,  can  manage  to  live  with  comfort,  are  still 
the  first  to  be  carried  off  by  epidemics ;  and  only  such  as 
are  robust  enough  to  resist  these — that  is,  only  such  as  are 
tolerably  well  adapted  to  both  the  usual  and  incidental 
necessities  of  existence,  remain.  And  thus  is  the  race 
kept  free  from  vitiation.  Of  course  this  statement  is  in 
substance  a  truism ;  for  no  other  arrangement  of  things 
is  conceivable.  But  it  is  a  truism  to  which  most  men  pay 
little  regard.  And  if  they  commonly  overlook  its  applica 
tion  to  body,  still  less  do  they  note  its  bearing  upon 
mind.  Yet  it  is  equally  true  here.  Nature  just  as  much 
insists  on  fitness  between  mental  character  and  circum- 


fV~ 


HOW   NATUKE   DEALS   WITH    HER   FAILURES.          415 

stances,  as  between  physical  character  and  circumstances ; 
and  radical  defects  are  as  much  causes  of  death  in  the  one 
case  as  in  the  other.  He  on  whom  his  own  stupidity,  or 
vice,  or  idleness,  entails  loss  of  life,  must,  in  the  generali 
zations  of  philosophy,  be  classed  with  the  victims  of  weak 
viscera  or  malformed  limbs.  In  his  case,  as  in  the  others, 
there  exists  a  fatal  non-adaptation ;  and  it  matters  not  in 
the  abstract  whether  it  be  a  moral,  an  intellectual,  or  a 
corporeal  one.  Beings  thus  imperfect  .are  nature's  fail 
ures,  and  are  recalled  by  her  laws  when  found  to  be  such. 
Along  with  the  rest  they  are  put  upon  trial.  If  they  are 
sufficiently  complete  to  live,  they  do  live,  and  it  is  well 
they  should  live.  If  they  are  not  sufficiently  complete  to 
live,  they  die,  and  it  is  best  they  should  die.  Whether 
the  incompleteness  be  in  strength,  or  agility,  or  percep 
tion,  or  foresight,  or  self-control,  is  not  heeded  in  the  rig 
orous  proof  they  are  put  to.  But  if  any  faculty  is  unu 
sually  deficient,  the  probabilities  are  that,  in  the  long  run, 
some  disastrous,  or,  in  the  worst  cases — fatal  result  will 
follow.  And,  however  irregular  the  action  of  this  law 
may  appear — however  it  may  seem  that  much  chaif  is  left 
behind  which  should  be  winnowed  out,  and  that  much 
grain  is  taken  away  which  should  be  left  behind,  yet  due 
consideration  must  satisfy  every  one  that  the  average  effect 
is  to  purify  society  from  those  who  are,  in  some  respect  or 
other,  essentially  faulty. 

Of  course,  in  so  far  asv.the  severity  of  this  process  is 
mitigated  by  the  spontaneous  sympathy  of  men  for  each 
other,  it  is  proper  that  it  should  be  mitigated :  albeit  there 
is  unquestionably  harm  done  when  sympathy  is  shown, 
without  any  regard  to  ultimate  results.  But  the  draw 
backs  hence  arising  are  nothing  like  commensurate  with 
the  benefits  otherwise  conferred.  Only  when  this  sympa 
thy  prompts  to  a  breach  of  equity — only  when  it  orig 
inates  an  interference  forbidden  by  the  law  of  equal  free- 


416  SANITARY    SUPERVISION. 

dom — -only  when,  by  so  doing,  it  suspends  in  some  partic 
ular  department  of  life  the  relationship  between  constitu 
tion  and  conditions,  does  it  work  pure  evil.  Then,  how 
ever,  it  defeats  its  own  end.  Instead  of  diminishing  suf 
fering,  it  eventually  increases  it.  It  favours  the  multipli 
cation  of  those  worst  fitted  for  existence,  arid,  by  conse 
quence,  hinders  the  multiplication  of  those  best  fitted  foi 
existence — leaving,  as  it  does,  less  room  for  them.  li 
tends  to  fill  the  world  with  those  to  whom  life  will  brine: 

o 

most  pain,  and  tends  to  keep  out  of  it  those  to  whom  life 
will  bring  most  pleasure.  It  inflicts  positive  misery,  and 
prevents  positive  happiness.  "7 

§  5.  Turning  now  to  consider  these  impatiently- 
agitated  schemes  for  improving  our  sanitary  condition  by 
act  of  parliament,  the  first  criticism  to  be  passed  upon 
them  is  that  they  are  altogether  needless,  inasmuch  as 
there  are  already  efficient  influences  at  work  gradually 
accomplishing  every  desideratum. 

Seeing,  as  do  the  philanthropic  of  our  day,  like  the  con- 
genitally  blind  to  whom  sight  has  just  been  given — look 
ing  at  things  through  the  newly-opened  eyes  of  sympathy 
— they  form  very  crude  and  very  exaggerated  notions  of 
the  evils  to  be  dealt  with.  Some,  anxious  for  the  enlighten 
ment  of  their  fellows,  collect  statistics  exhibiting  a  lament 
able  amount  of  ignorance  ;  publish  these ;  and  the  lovers 
of  their  kind  are  startled.  Others  dive  into  the  dens 
where  poverty  hides  itself,  and  shock  the  world  with  de 
scriptions  of  what  they  sep.  Others,  again,  gather  together 
information  respecting  crime,  and  make  the  benevolent 
look  grave  by  their  disclosures.  Whereupon,  in  their 
horror  at  these  revelations,  men  keep  thoughtlessly  assum 
ing  that  the  evils  have  lately  become  greater,  when  in 
reality  it  is  they  who  have  become  more  observant  of 
them.  If  few  complaints  have  hitherto  been  heard  about 


VISIONAEY  VIEWS    OF   EEFOKM.  417 

crime,  and  ignorance,  and  misery,  it  is  not  that  in  times 
past  these  were,  less  widely  spread ;  for  the  contrary  is 
the  fact ;  but  it  is,  that  our  forefathers  were  comparatively 
indifferent  to  them — thought  little  about  them,  and  said 
little  about  them.  Overlooking  which  circumstance,  and 
forgetting  that  social  evils  have  been  undergoing  a  gradual 
amelioration — an  amelioration  likely  to  progress  with  in 
creasing  rapidity — many  entertain  a  needless  alarm  lest 
fearful  consequences  should  ensue,  if  these  evils  are  not 
immediately  remedied,  and  a  visionary  hope  that  immedi 
ate  remedy  of  them  is  possible. 

Such  are  the  now  prevalent  feelings  relative  to  sanitary 
reform.  We  have  had  a  multitude  of  blue-books,  Board 
of  Health  reports,  leading  articles,  pamphlets,  and  lectures, 
descriptive  of  bad  drainage,  overflowing  cesspools,  fester 
ing  graveyards,  impure  water,  and  the  filthiness  and 
humidity  of  low  lodging  houses.  The  facts  thus  published 
are  thought  to  warrant,  or  rather  to  demand,  legislative 
interference.  It  seems  never  to  be  asked,  whether  any 
corrective  process  is  going  on.  Although  every  one  knows 
that  the  rate  of  mortality  has  been  gradually  decreasing, 
and  that  the  value  of  life  is  higher  in  England  than  else 
where — although  every  one  knows  that  the  cleanliness  of 
our  towns  is  greater  now  than  ever  before,  and  that  our 
spontaneously-grown  sanitary  arrangements  are  far  better 
than  those  existing  on  the  Continent,  where  the  stinks  of 
Cologne,  the  uncovered  drains  of  Paris,  the  water-tubs  of 
Berlin,*  and  the  miserable  footways  of  the  German  towns, 
show  what  state-management  effects — although  every  one 
knows  these  things,  yet  it  is  perversely  assumed  that  by 
state-management  only  can  the  remaining  impediments  to 
public  health  be  removed.  /Surely  the  causes  which  have 

*  For  putting  out  fires  in  Berlin  they  depend  on  open  tubs  of  water 
that  stand  about  the  city  at  certain  points,  ready  to  be  dragged  where  they 
are  wanted. 

18* 


4:18  SANITARY    SUPEK VISION. 

brought  the  sewage,  the  paving  and  lighting,  and  the 
water-supply  of  our  towns,  to  their  present  state,  have 
not  suddenly  ceased.  Surely  that  amelioration,  which 
has  been  taking  place  in  the  condition  of  London  for  these 
two  or  three  centuries,  may  be  expected  to  continue. 
Surely  the  public  spirit,  which  has  carried  out  so  many 
urban  improvements  since  the  Municipal  Corporations 
Act  gave  greater  facilities,  can  carry  out  other  improve 
ments.-  Surely,  if  all  that  has  been  done  toward  making 
cities  healthy,  has  been  done,  not  only  without  govern 
ment  aid,  but  in  spite  of  government  obstructions — in 
spite,  that  is,  of  the-  heavy  expense  of  local  acts  of  parlia 
ment — we  may  reasonably  suppose,  that  what  remains  to 
be  done  can  be  done  in  the  same  way,  especially  if  the 
obstructions  are  removed.  One  would  have  thought  that 
less  excuse  for  meddling  existed  now  than  ever.  Now 
that  so  much  has  been  effected ;  now  that  spontaneous  ad 
vance  is  being  made  at  an  unparalleled  rate ;  now  that  the 
laws  of  health  are  beginning  to  be  generally  studied ;  now 
that  people  are  reforming  their  habits  of  living  ;  now  that 
the  use  of  baths  is  spreading ;  now  that  temperance,  and 
ventilation,  and  due  exercise  are  getting  thought  about — to 
interfere  now,  of  all  times,  is  surely  as  rash  and  uncalled- 
for  a  step  as  was  ever  taken. 

And  then  to  think  that,  in  their  hot  haste  to  obtain  by 
law  healthier  homes  for  the  masses,  man  should  not  see 
that  the  natural  process  already  commenced  is  the  only 
process  which  can  eventually  succeed.  iThe  Metropolitan 
Association  for  Improving  the  Dwellings  of  the  Labouring 
Classes  is  doing  all  that  is  possible  in  the  matter.  It  is 
endeavouring  to  show  that,  under  judicious  management, 
the  building  of  salubrious  habitations  for  the  poor  becomes 
a  profitable  employment  of  capital:/  If  it  shows  this,  it 
will  do  all  that  needs  to  be  done  ;  for  capital  will  quickly 
How  into  investments  offering  good  returns.  ^If  it  does  not 


DWELLINGS    FOE   THE   LABORING   CLASSES.  419 

show  this — if,  after  due  trial,  it  finds  that  these  Model 
Lodging  Houses  do  not  pay,  and  that  better  accommoda 
tion  than  the  working  people  now  have  can  be  obtained 
for  them  only  by  diminishing  the  interest  on  money  sunk  in 
building,  then  not  all  the  acts  of  parliament  that  can  be 
passed  between  now  and  doomsday  will  improve  matters 
one  jot.  These  plans  for  making  good  ventilation  impera 
tive  ;  insisting  upon  water-supply,  and  fixing  the  price 
for  it,  as  Lord  Morpeth's  Bill  would  have  done ;  having 
empty  houses  cleansed  before  reoccupation,  and  charging 
the  owners  of  them  for  inspection — these  plans  for  coer 
cing  landlords  into  giving,  additional  advantages  for  the 
same  money  are  nothing  but  repetitions  of  the  old  propo 
sal,  that  the  "  three-hooped  pot  shall  have  ten  hoops,"  and 
are  just  as  incapable  of  realization.  The  first  result  of  an 
attempt  to  carry  them  out  would  be  a  diminution  of  the 
profits  of  house-owners.  The  interest  on  capital  invested 
in  houses  no  longer  being  so  high,  capital  would  seek 
other  investments.  The  building  of  houses  would  cease 
to  keep  pace  with  the  growth  of  population.  Hence 
would  arise  a  gradual  increase  in  the  number  of  occupants 
to  each  house.  And  this  change  in  the  ratio  of  houses  to 
people  would  continue  until  the  demand  for  houses  had 
raised  the  pjofits  of  the  landlord  to  what  they  were,  and 
until,  by  overcrowding,  new  sanitary  evils  had  been  pro 
duced  to  parallel  the  old  ones.*  If,  by  building  in  larger 

*  Such  results  have  actually  been  brought  about  by  the  Metropolitan 
Buildings  Act.  Whilst  this  Act  has  introduced  some  reform  in  the  better 
class  of  houses  (although  to  nothing  like  the  expected  extent,  for  the  sur 
veyors  are  bribed,  and  moreover  the  fees  claimed  by  them  for  inspecting 
every  trifling  alteration  operate  as  penalties  on  improvement),  it  has  en 
tailed  far  more  evil,  just  where  it  was  intended  to  confer  benefit.  An 
architect  and  surveyor  describes  it  as  having  worked  after  the  following 
manner.  In  those  districts  of  London  consisting  of  inferior  houses,  built 
in  that  insubstantial  fashion  which  the  New  Building  Act  was  to  mend, 
there  obtains  an  average  rent,  sufficiently  remunerative  to  landlords  whose 


420  SANITARY    SUPEKVISION. 

masses,  and  to  a  greater  height,  such  an  economy  can  be 
achieved  in  ground-rent,  the  cost  of  outer  walls,  and  of 
roofing,  as  to  give  more  accommodation  at  the  same 
expense  as  now  (which  happily  seems  probable),  then 
the  fact  only  needs  proving,  and,  as  before  said,  the 
competition  of  capital  for  investment  will  do  all  that 
can  be  done ;  but  if  not,  the  belief  that  legislative  coer 
cion  can  make  things  better  is  a  fit  companion  to  the 
belief  that  it  can  fix  the  price  of  bread  and  the  rate  of 
wages. 

Let  those  w^ho  are  anxious  to  improve  the  health  of 
the    poor,  through  the  indirect  machinery  of  law,  bring 

houses  were  run  up  economically  before  the  New  Building  Act  passed. 
This  existing  average  rent  fixes  the  rent  that  must  be  charged  in  these 
districts  for  new  houses  of  the  same  accommodation — that  is,  the  same  num 
ber  of  rooms,  for  the  people  they  are  built  for  do  not  appreciate  the  extra 
safety  of  living  within  walls  strengthened  with  hoop-iron  bond.  Now  it 
turns  out  upon  trial,  that  houses  built  in  accordance  with  the  present  regu 
lations,  and  let  at  this  established  rate,  bring  in  nothing  like  a  reasonable 
return.  Builders  have  consequently  confined  themselves  to  erecting  houses 
in  better  districts  (where  the  possibility  of  a  profitable  competition  with 
preexisting  houses  shows  that  those  preexisting  houses  were  tolerably 
substantial),  and  have  ceased  to  erect  dwellings  for  the  masses,  except  in 
the  suburbs  where  no  pressing  sanitary  evils  exist.  Meanwhile,  in  the  in 
ferior  districts  above  described,  has  resulted  an  increase  of-  overcrowding — 
half-a-dozen  families  in  a  house — a  score  lodgers  to  a  room.  Nay,  more 
than  this  has  resulted.  That  state  of  miserable  dilapidation  into  which 
these  abodes  of  the  poor  are  allowed  to  fall,  is  due  to  the  absence  of  com 
petition  from  new  houses.  Landlords  do  not  find  their  tenants  tempted 
away  by  the  ofler  of  better  accommodation.  Repairs,  being  unnecessary  for 
securing  the  largest  amount  of  profit,  are  not  made.  And  the  fees  de 
manded  by  the  surveyor,  even  when  an  additional  chimney-pot  is  put  up, 
supply  ready  excuses  for  doing  nothing.  Thus,  wjiilst  the  New  Building  Act 
has  caused  some  improvement  where  improvement  was  not  greatly  needed, 
it  has  caused  none  where  it  was  needed,  but  has  instead  generated  evils 
worse  than  those  it  was  to  remove.  In  fact,  for  a  large  percentage  of  the 
very  horrors  which  our  sanitary  agitators  are  now  trying  to  cure  by  law,  we 
have  to  thank  previous  agitators  of  the  same  school ! 


HOW   THE   WOEK   IS    TO   BE   DONE.  421 

their  zeal  to  bear  directly  upon  the  work  to  be  done.  Let 
them  appeal  to  men's  sympathies,  and  again  to  their  in 
terests.  Let  them  prove  to  people  of  property  that  the 
making  of  these  reforms  will  pay.  Let  them  show  that 
the  productive  powers  of  the  labourer  will  be  increased  by 
bettering  his  health,  whilst  the  poors'-rate  will  be  dimin 
ished.  Above  all,  let  them  demand  the  removal  of  those 
obstacles  which  existing  legislation  puts  in  the  way  of 
sanitary  improvement.*  Their  efforts  thus  directed  will 
really  promote  progress.  Whereas  their  efforts  as  now 
directed  are  either  needless  or  injurious. 

§  6.  These  endeavours  to  increase  the  salubrity  of 
town-life  by  law,  are  not  only  open  to  the  criticism  that 
the  natural  forces  already  at  work  render  them  unneces 
sary,  and  to  the  additional  criticism  that  some  of  the 
things  strained  after  are  impossible  of  legislative  achieve 
ment,  but  it  must  further  be  observed,  that  even  the 
desiderata  which  acts  of  parliament  will  reach,  can  be  so 
reached  only  through  very  faulty  instrumentalities.  It  is, 
in  this  case,  as  in  many  others,  the  peculiarity  of  what  are 

*  Writing  before  the  repeal  of  the  brick-duty,  the  Builder  says,  "  It  is 
supposed  that  one-fourth  of  the  cost  of  a  dwelling  which  lets  for  2s.  Qd.  or  3s. 
a  week  is  caused  by  the  expense  of  the  title-deeds  and  the  tax  on  wood  and 
bricks  used  in  its  construction.  Of  course  the  owner  of  such  property  must 
be  remunerated,  and  he  therefore  charges  *l$d.  or  9d.  a  week  to  cover  these 
burdens."  Mr.  C.  Gatliff,  secretary  to  the  Society  for  Improving  the  Dwell 
ings  of  the  Working  Classes,  describing  the  effect  of  the  window-tax,  says, 
"  They  are  now  paying  upon  their  institution  in  St.  Pancras  the  sum  of 
£162  16s.  in  window-duties,  or  1  per  cent,  "per  annum  upon  the  original 
outlay.  The  average  rental  paid  by  the  Society's  tenants  is  5s.  6d.  per 
week,  and  the  window-duty  deducts  from  this  7J<£  per  week." — Deputation 
to  Lord  Ashley,  see  Times,  Jan.  31,  1850.  Mr.  W.  Voller,  a  master-tailor, 
says,  "  I  lately  inserted  one  of  Dr.  Arnott's  ventilators  in  the  chimney  of 
the  workshop,  little  thinking  I  should  be  called  upon  by  Mr.  Badger,  our 
district  surveyor,  for  a  fee  of  25s." — Morning  Chronicle,  Feb.  4,  1850. 


422  SANITARY   SUPERVISION. 

oddly  styled  "  practical  measures,"  that  they  supersede 
agencies  which  are  answering  well  by  agencies  which  are 
not  likely  to  answer  well.  Here  is  a  heavy  charge  of 
inefficiency  brought  against  the  drains,  cesspools,  stink- 
traps,  &c.,  of  England  in  general,  and  London  in  particu 
lar.  The  evidence  is  voluminous  and  conclusive,  and  by 
common  consent  a  verdict  of  proven  is  returned.  Citizens 
look  grave  and  determine  to  petition  parliament  about 
it.  Parliament  promises  to  consider  the  matter ;  and  after 
the  usual  amount  of  debate,  says — "  Let  there  be  a  Board 
of  Health."  Whereupon  petitioners  rub  their  hands,  and 
look  out  for  great  things.  They  have  unbounded  sim 
plicity — these  good  citizens.  Legislation  may  disappoint 
them  fifty  times  running,  without  at  all  shaking  their  faith 
in  its'  efficiency.  /They  hoped  that  Church  abuses  would 
be  rectified  by  the  Ecclesiastical  Commission ;  the  poor 

^curates   can   say  whether  that   hope   has  been  realized. 

/Backed  by  an  act  of  parliamentj  the  Poor-Law  Commis 
sioners  were  to  have  eradicated  able-bodied  pauperism : 
yet,  until  checked  by  the  recent  prosperity,  the  poors'- 
rates  have  been  rapidly  rising  to  their  old  level.  The 
New  Building  Afct  was  to  have  given  the  people  ^of  Lon 
don  better  homes ;  whereas,  as  we  lately  saw,  it  has  made 
worse  the  homes  that  most  wanted  improving./'  Men 
were  sanguine  of  reforming  criminals  by  the  silent  system, 
or  the  separate  system ;  but,  if  we  are  to  judge  by  the  dis 
putes  of  their  respective  advocates,  neither  of  these  plans 
is  very  successful.  ^Pauper  children  were  to  have  been 
made  into  good  citizens  by  industrial  education ;  from  all 
quarters,  however,  come  statements  that  a  very  large  per 
centage  of  them  get  into  gaol,  or  become  prostitutes,  or 
return  to  the  workhouse.7  /The  measures  enjoined  by  the 
Vaccination  Act  of  1840  were  to  have  exterminated  small 
pox;  yet  the  Registrar-General's  reports  show  that  the 
deaths  from  small-pox  have  been  increasing^  And  thus 


INEXHAUSTIBLE   FAITH   IN   LAW    SCHEMES.  423 

does  year  after  year  add  to  those  abortive  schemes,  of 
which  so  many  have  been  quoted  (pp.  18,  60,  31V).  Yet 
scarcely  a  doubt  seems  to  arise,  respecting  the  compe 
tency  of  legislators  to  do  what  they  profess.  From  the 
times  when  they  tried  to  fix  the  value  of  money  down  to 
our  own  day,  when  they  have  but  just  abandoned  the 
attempt  to  fix  the  price  of  corn,  statesmen  have  been 
undertaking  all  kinds  of  things,  from  regulating  the  cut 
of  boot-toes,  up  to  preparing  people  for  Heaven ;  and  have 
been  constantly  failing,  or  producing  widely-different 
results  from  those  intended.  Nevertheless  such  inex 
haustible  faith  have  men,  that,  although  they  see  this,  and 
although  they  are  daily  hearing  of  imbecilities  in  public 
departments — of  Admiralty  Boards  that  squander  three 
millions  a  year  in  building  bad  ships  and  breaking  them 
up  again — of  Woods  and  Forests  Commissioners  who  do 
not  even  know  the  rental  of  the  estates  they  manage — of 
bungling  excise-chemists  who  commit  their  chiefs  to  los 
ing  prosecutions,  for  which  compensation  has  to  be  made 
— -yet  government  needs  but  to  announce  another  plausi 
ble  project,  and  men  straightway  hurrah,  and  throw  up 
their  caps,  in  the  full  expectation  of  getting  all  that  is 
promised. 

But  the  belief  that  Boards  of  Health,  and  the  like, 
will  never  effect  what  is  hoped,  needs  not  wholly  rest 
either  upon  abstract  considerations,  or  upon  our  expe 
rience  of  state-instrumentalities  in  general.  "We  have  one 
of  these  organizations/at  work,  and,  as  far  as  may  be  at 
present  judged,  it  has  done  any  thing  but  answer  peo 
ple's  expectations.  To  condemn  it,  because  choked  sew 
ers,  and  open  gully-holes,  and  filthy  alleys  remain  much 
'as  they  were,  would,  perhaps,  be  unreasonable,  for  time  is 
needed  to  rectify  evils  so  widely  established.  '  But  there 
is  one  test  by  which  we  may  fairly  estimate  its  efficiency, 
viz.,  its  conduct  before  and  during  the  late  pestilence.  It 


4:24:  SANITARY    SUPERVISION. 

had  more  than  a  year's  notice  that  the  cholera  was  on  its 
way  here.  There  were  two  whole  sessions  of  parliament 
intervening  between  the  time  when  a  second  invasion 
from  that  disease  was  foreseen  and  the  time  when  the 
mortality  was  the  highest.  The  Board  of  Health  had, 
therefore,  full  opportunity  to  put  forth  its  powers,  and  to 
get  greater  powers  if  it  wanted  them.  Well,  what  was 
the  first  step  that  might  have  been  looked  for  from  it  ? 
Shall  we  not  say  the  suppression  of  intramural  interments  ? 
Burying  the  dead  in  the  midst  of  the  living  was  mani 
festly  hurtful ;  the  evils  attendant  on  the  practice  were 
universally  recognized ;  and  to  put  it  down  required  little 
more  than  a  simple  exercise  of  authority.  If  the  Board  of 
Health  believed  itself  possessed  of  authority  sufficient  for 
this,  why  did  it  not  use  that  authority  when  the  advent 
of  the  epidemic  was  rumoured  ?  If  it  thought  its  author 
ity  not  great  enough  (which  can  hardly  be,  remembering 
what  it  ultimately  did),  then  why  did  it  not  obtain  more? 
Instead  of  taking  either  of  these  steps,  however,  it  occu 
pied  itself  in  considering  future  modes  of  water-supply, 
and  devising  systems  of  sewerage.  Whilst  the  cholera 
was  approaching,  the  Board  of  Health  was  cogitating 
over  reforms,  from  which  the  most  sanguine  could  not  ex 
pect  any  considerable  benefit  for  years  to  comeT/  And 
then,  when  the  enemy  was  upon  us,  this  guardian,  in 
which  men  were  putting  their  trust,  suddenly  bestirred 
itself,  and  did  what,  for  the  time  being,  made  worse  the 
evils  to  be  remedied.  As  was  said  by  a  speaker,  at  one 
of  the  medical  meetings  held  during  the  height  of  the 
cholera,  "  the  Commissioners  of  Public  Health  had  adopted 
the  very  means  likely  to  produce  that  complaint.  Instead 
of  taking  their  measures  years  ago,  they  had  stirred  up 
all  sorts  of  abominations  now.  They  had  removed  dung 
hills  and  cesspools,  and  added  fuel  tenfold  to  the  fire  that 
existed.  Never  since  he  could  recollect  had  there  been 


INEFFICIENCY    OF   BOARDS    OF    HEALTH.  425 

such  accumulations  of  abominable  odours  as  since  the 
Health  of  Towns  Commission  had  attempted  to  purify  the 
atmosphere.  At  length,  when,  in  spite  of  all  that  had 
been  done  (or,  perhaps,  partly  in  consequence  of  it),  the 
mortality  continued  to  increase,  the  closing  of  graveyards 
was  decided  upon,  in  the  hope,  as  we  must  suppose,  that 
the  mortality  would  thereby  be  checked.  As  though, 
when  there  were  hundreds  of  thousands  of  bodies  decom 
posing,  the  ceasing  to  add  to  them  would  immediately  pro 
duce  an  appreciable  effect ! 

If  to  these  facts  we  add  the  further  one,  that,  notwith 
standing  the  directions  issued  for  prophylactic  treatment, 
and  the  system  of  domiciliary  visits,  the  cholera  carried 
off  a  greater  number  than  before,  we  have  some  reason  for 
thinking  that  this  sanitary  guardianship  did  no  good,  but, 
it  may  be,  even  harm. 

Should  it  be  said  that  the  Board  of  Health  is  badly 
constituted,  or  has  not  sufficient  power,  and  that  had  a 
better  organization  been  given  to  it  we  should  have  seen 
different  results,  the  reply  is,  that  the  almost  invariable 
occurrence  of  some  such  fatal  hitch  is  one  of  the  reasons 
for  condemning  these  interferences.  There  is  always 
some  provoking  if  in  the  way.  If  the  established  clergy 
were  what  they  should  be,  a  state-church  might  do  some 
good.  If  parish  relief  were  judiciously  administered,  a 
poor-law  would  not  be  so  bad  a  thing.  And  if  a  sanitary 
organization  could  be  made  to  do  just  what  it  is  intended 
to  do,  something  might  be  said  in  its  favour. 

§  7.  Even  could  state-agency  compass  for  our  towns 
the  most  perfect  salubrity,  it  would  be  in  the  end  better 
to  remain  as  we  are,  rather  than  obtain  such  a  benefit  by 
such  means.  It  is  quite  possible  to  give  too  much  even 
for.  a  great  desideratum.  However  valuable  good  bodily 
health  may  be,  it  is  very  dearly  purchased  when  mental 


426  SANITAEY   SUPERVISION. 

health  goes  in  exchange.  Whoso  thinks  that  government 
can  supply  sanitary  advantages  for  nothing,  or  at  the  cost 
of  more  taxes  only,  is  woefully  mistaken.  They  must  be 
paid  for  with  character  as  well  as  with  taxes.  A  full 
equivalent  must  be  given  in  other  coin  than  gold,  and  even 
more  than  an  equivalent. 

Let  it  be  again  remembered  that  ^en  cannot  make 
force./  All  they  can  do  is  to  avail  themselves  of  force  al 
ready  existing,  and  employ  it  for  working  out  this  or  that 
purpose.  They  cannot  increase  it ;  they  cannot  get  from 
it  more  than  its  specific  eifect ;  and  as  much  as  they  ex 
pend  of  it  for  doing  one  thing,  must  they  lack  of  it  for 
doing  other  things.  Thus  it  is  now  becoming  a  received 
doctrine,  that  what  we  call  chemical  affinity,  heat,  light, 
electricity,  magnetism,  and  motion,  are  all  manifestations 
of  the  same  primordial  force — that  they  are  severally  con 
vertible  into  each  other — and,  as  a  corollary,  that  it  is  im 
possible  to  obtain  in  any  one  form  of  this  force  more  than 
its  equivalent  in  the  previous  form.  Now  this  is  equally 
true  of  the/agencies  acting  in  society^:  It  is  quite  possible 
to  divert  the  power  at  present  working  out  one  result,  to 
the  working  out  of  some  other  result.  You  may  trans 
form  one  kind  of  influence  into  another  kind.  But  you 
cannot  make  more  of  it,  and  you  cannot  have  it  for  noth 
ing.  You  cannot,  by  legislative  manoeuvring,  get  in 
creased  ability  to  achieve  a  desired  object,  except  at  the 
expense  of  something  elseI7  Just  as  much  better  as  this 
particular  thing  is  done,  so  much  worse  must  another  thing 
be  done. 

Or,  changing  the  illustration,  and  regarding  society  as 
an  organism,  we  may  say  that  it  is  impossible  artificially 
to  use  up  social  vitality  for  the  more  active  performance 
of  one  function,  without  diminishing  the  activity  with 
which  other  functions  are  performed.  So  long  as  society 
is  let  alone,  its  various  organs  will  go  on  developing  in 


NATURAL    GROWTH    OF   SOCIETY.  427 

due  subordination  to  each  other.  If  some  of  them  are 
very  imperfect,  and  make  no  appreciable  progress  toward 
efficiency,  be  sure  it  is  because  still  aaaore  important  organs 
are  equally  imperfect^nd  because  the  amount  of  vital 
force  pervading  society  being  limited,  the  rapid  growth 
of  these  involves  cessation  of  growth  elsewhere.'  xBe  sure, 
also,  that  whenever  there  arises  a  special  necessity  for  the 
better  performance  of  any  one  function,  or  for  the  estab 
lishment  of  some  new  function,  nature  will  respond.  In 
stance  in  proof  of  this,  the  increase  of  particular  manu 
facturing  towns  and  seaports,  or  the  formation  of  incor 
porated  companies.  Is  there  a  rising  demand  for  some 
commodity  of  general  consumption  ?  Immediately  the 
organ  secreting  that  commodity  becomes  more  active,  ab 
sorbs  more  people,  begins  to  enlarge,  and  secretes  in 
greater  abundance.  Instrumentalities  for  the  fulfilment 
of  other  social  requirements — for  the  supply  of  religious 
culture,  education,  and  so  forth,  are  similarly  provided : 
the  less  needful  being  postponed  to  the  more  needful ;  just 
as  the  several  parts  of  the  embryo  are  developed  in  the 
order  of  their  subservience  to  life.  (To  interfere  with  this 
process  by  producing  premature  development  in  any  par 
ticular  direction  is  inevitably  to  disturb  the  due  balance 
of  organization,  by  causing  somewhere  else  a  correspond 
ing  atrophy:  Let  it  never  be  forgotten  thaUat  any  given 
time  the  amount  of  a  society's  vital  force  is  fixed.  ?  De 
pendent  as  is  that  vital  force  upon  the  degree  of  adapta 
tion  that  has  taken  place — upon  the  extent  to  which  men 
have  acquired  fitness  for  cooperative  life — upon  the  effi 
ciency  with  which  they  can  combine  as  elements  of  the 
social  organism,  we  may  be  quite  certain  that,  whilst  their 
characters  remain  constant,  nothing  can  increase  its  total 
quantity.  We  may  be  also  certain  that  this  total  quan 
tity  can  produce  only  its  exact  equivalent  of  results ;  and 
that  no  legislators  can  get  more  from  it ;  although  by 
wasting  it  they  may,  and  always  do,  get  less. 


428  SANITARY    SUPERVISION. 

Already,  in  treating  of  Poor-Laws  and  National  Edu 
cation,  we  have  examined  in  detail  the  reaction  by  which 
/  these  attempts  at  a  multiplication  of  results  are  defeated. 
1  In  the  case  of  sanitary  administrations,  a  similar  reaction 
may  be  traced;  showing  itself,  amongst  other  ways,  in 
the  checking  of  all  social  improvements  that  demand 
popular  enterprise  and  perseverance;  }  Under  the  natural 
order  of  things,  the  unfolding  of  an  intelligent,  self-help 
ing  character,  must  keep  pace  with  the  amelioration  of 
physical  circumstances — the  advance  of  the  one  with  the 
exertions  put  forth  to  achieve  the  other ;  so  that  in  estab 
lishing  arrangements  conducive  to  robustness  of  body,  ro 
bustness  of  mind  must  be  insensibly  acquired.  Contrari 
wise,  to  whatever  extent  activity  of  thought  and  firm 
ness  of  purpose  are  made  less  needful  by  an  artificial  per 
formance  of  their  work,  to  that  same  extent  must  their 
increase,  and  the  dependent  social  improvements  be  re 
tarded. 

Should  proof  of  this  be  asked  for,  it  may  be  found  in 
the  contrast  between  English  energy  and  Continental 
helplessness.  English  engineers  (Manby,  Wilson,  and 
Co.)  established  the  first  gas  works  in  Paris,  after  the  fail 
ure  of  a  French  company;  and  many  of  the  gas-works 
throughout  Europe  have  been  constructed  by  Englishmen. 
An  English  engineer  (Miller)  introduced  steam  navigation 
on  the  Rhone  ;  another  English  engineer  (Pritchard)  suc 
ceeded  in  ascending  the  Danube  by  steam,  after  the  French 
and  Germans  had  failed.  The  first  steamboats  on  the 
Loire  were  built  by  Englishmen  (Fawcett  and  Preston) ; 
the  great  suspension  bridge  at  Pesth  has  been  built  by  an 
Englishman  (Tierney  Clarke) ;  and  an  Englishman  (Vig- 
nolles)  is  now  building  a  still  greater  suspension  bridge 
over  the  Dnieper ;  many  continental  railways  have  had 
Englishmen  as  consulting  engineers ;  and  in  spite  of  the 
celebrated  Mining  College  at  Freyburg,  several  of  the 


ENGLISH  ENERGY  AND  CONTINENTAL  HELPLESSNESS.    429 

mineral  fields  along  the  Rhine  have  been  opened  up  by 
English  capital  employing  English  skill.  Now  why  is 
this  ?  Why  were  our  coaches  so  superior  to  the  diligences 
and  eilwagen  of  our  neighbours  ?  Why  did  our  railway 
system  develop  so  much  faster  ?  Why  are  our  towns  bet 
ter  drained,  better  paved,  and  better  supplied  with  water  ? 
There  was  originally  no  greater  mechanical  aptitude,  and 
no  greater  desire  to  progress  in  us  than  in  the  connate  na 
tions  of  northern  Europe.  If  any  thing,  we  were  com 
paratively  deficient  in  these  respects.  Early  improve 
ments  in  the  arts  of  life  were  imported.  The  germs  of  our 
silk  and  woollen  manufactures  came  from  abroad.  The 
first  water-works  in  London  were  erected  by  a  Dutchman. 
How  happens  it,  then,  that  we  have  now  reversed  the  re 
lationship?  How  happens  it,  that  instead  of  being  de 
pendent  on  continental  skill  and  enterprise,  our  skill  and 
enterprise  are  at  a  premium  on  the  Continent  ?  Manifestly 
the  change  is  due  to  difference  of  discipline.  Having  been 
left  in  a  greater  degree  than  others  to  manage  their  own 
affairs,  the  English  people  have  become  self-helping,  and 
have  acquired  great  practical  ability.  Whilst  conversely 
that  comparative  helplessness  of  the  paternally-governed 
nations  of  Europe,  illustrated  in  the  above  facts,  and  com 
mented  upon  by  Laing,  in  his  "  Notes  of  a  Traveller,"  and 
by  other  observers,  is  a  natural  result  of  the  state-super 
intendence  policy — is  the  reaction  attendant  on  the  action 
of  official  mechanisms — is  the  atrophy  corresponding  to 
some  artificial  hypertrophy. 

§  8.  One  apparent  difficulty  accompanying  the  doc 
trine  now  contended  for  remains  to  be  noticed.  If  sani 
tary  administration  by  the  state  be  wrong,  because  it  im 
plies  a  deduction  from  the  citizen's  property  greater  than 
is  needful  for  maintaining  his  rights,  then  is  sanitary  ad 
ministration  by  municipal  authorities  wrong  also  for  the 


4:30  SANITAEY   SUFEEVISION. 

same  reason.  Be  it  by  general  government  or  by  local 
government,  the  levying  of  compulsory  rates  for  drainage, 
and  for  paving  and  lighting,  is  inadmissible,  as  indirectly 
making  legislative  protection  more  costly  than  necessary, 
or,  in  other  words,  turning  it  into  aggression  (p.  306) ; 
and  if  so,  it  follows  that  neither  the  past,  present,  nor 
proposed  methods  of  securing  the  health  of  towns  are 
equitable. 

This  seems  an  awkward  conclusion ;  nevertheless,  as 
cleducible  from  our  general  principle,  we  have  no  alterna 
tive  but  to  take  to  it.  How  streets  and  courts  are  rightly 
to  be  kept  in  order  remains  to  be  considered.  Respecting 
sewerage  there  would  be  no  difficulty.  '  Houses  might 
readily  be  drained  on  the  same  mercantile  principle  that 
they  are  now  supplied  with  water.  It  is  highly  probable 
that  in  the  hands  of  a  private  company  the  resulting  ma 
nure  would  not  only  pay  the  cost  of  collection,  but  would 
yield  a  considerable  profit.  But  if  not,  the  return  on  the 
invested  capital  would  be  made  up  by  charges  to  those 

whose   houses  were   drained:   the  alternative  of  havino- 

& 

their  connections  with  the  main  sewer  stopped,  being  as 
good  a  security  for  payment  as  the  analogous  ones  pos 
sessed  by  water  and  gas  companiesr>lPaving  and  lighting 
would  properly  fall  to  the  management  of  house-owners. 
Were  there  no  public  provision  for  such  conveniences, 
house-owners  would  quickly  find  it  their  interest  to  furnish 
them.  Some  speculative  building  society  having  set  the 
example  of  improvement  in  this  direction,  competition 
would  do  the  rest.  Dwellings  without  proper  footway 
before  them,  and  with  no  lamps  to  show  the  tenants  to 
their  doors,  would  stand  empty,  when  better  accommoda 
tion  was  offered.  And  good  paving  and  lighting  having 
thus  become  essential,  landlords  would  combine  for  the 
more  economical  supply  of  them. 

To   the   objection  that  the   perversity  of  individual 


THE   LAW   OF   CHANGING   INSTITUTIONS.  431 

landlords  and  the  desire  of  others  to  take  unfair  advan 
tage  of  the  rest,  would  render  such  an  arrangement  imprac 
ticable,  the  reply  is  that  in  new  suburban  streets  not  yet 
taken  to  by  the  authorities  such  an  arrangement  is,  to  a 
considerable  extent,  already  carried  out,  and  would  be 
much  better  carried  out  but  for  the  consciousness  that  it 
is  merely  temporary.  Moreover,  no  adverse  inference 
could  be  drawn,  were  it  even  shown  that  for  the  present 
such  an  arrangement  is  impracticable.  So,  also,  was  per 
sonal  freedom  once.  So  once  was  representative  govern 
ment,  and  is  still  with  many  nations.  As  repeatedly 
pointed  out,  the  practicability  of  recognizing  men's  rights 
is  proportionate  to  the  degree  in  which  men  have  become 
moral.  That  an  organization  dictated  by  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  cannot  yet  be  fully  realized  is  no  j>roof  of  its  im 
perfection  :  is  proof  only  of  our  imperfection.  And  as  by 
diminishing  this,  the  process  of  adaptation  has  already  fit 
ted  us  for  institutions  which  were  once  too  good  for  us,  so 
will  it  go  on  to  fit  us  for  others  that  may  be  too  good  for 
us  now. 

§  9.  We  find,  then,  that  besides  being  at  variance 
with  the  moral  law,  and  besides  involving  absurdities,  the 
dogma  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  state  to  protect  the  health 
of  its  subjects  may  be  successfully  combated  on  grounds 
of  policy.  It  turns  out,  upon  examination,  to  be  near 
akin  to  the  older  dogma  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  state  to 
provide  for  the  spiritual  welfare  of  its  subjects — must,  if 
consistently  followed  out,  necessitate  a  coextensive  organi 
zation — and  must,  for  aught  there  appears  to  the  contrary, 
produce  analogous  results.  Of  the  sufferings  consequent 
upon  unrestrained  empiricism,  it  may  safely  be  said  that 
they  are  not  so  great  as  is  represented ;  and  that  in  as  far 
as  they  do  exist,  they  are  amongst  the  penalties  nature 
lias  attached  to  ignorance  or  imbecility,  and  which  cannot 


432  CURRENCY,  POSTAL   ARRANGEMENTS,  ETC. 

be  dissociated  from  it  without  ultimately  entailing  much 
greater  sufferings.  The  anxiety  to  improve  by  legislative 
measures  the  salubrity  of  our  towns,  is  deprecated  on  the 
ground  that  natural  causes  insure  the  continuance  of  pro 
gress — insure  further  sanitary  reforms,  just  as  they  insure 
advancement  in  the  arts  of  life,  the  development  of  manu 
factures,  and  commerce,  and  the  spread  of  education. 
Moreover,  it  appears  that  such  of  these  measures  as  are 
directed  to  the  improvement  of  habitations,  aim  at  what 
laws  either  cannot  do,  or  what  is  being  done  much  better 
without  them ;  and  to  the  rest  it  is  objected,  that  they  are 
not  likely  to  accomplish  the  proposed  end — a  belief 
founded  upon  the  results  of  all  analogous  legislation,  and 
confirmed  by  the  little  experience  we  have  at  present 
had  of  sanitary  legislation  itself  Further  it  is  argued 
that  even  could  the  hoped-for  advantages  be  fully  realized 
they  would  be  purchased  at  too  great  a  cost ;  seeing  that 
they  could  be  obtained  only  by  an  equivalent  retarda 
tion  in  some  still  more  important  department  of  social 
progress. 


CHAPTEK    XXIX. 

CURRENCY,   POSTAL    ARRANGEMENTS,    ETC. 

§  1.  So  constantly  have  the  ideas  currency  and  gov 
ernment  been  associated — so  universal  has  been  the  con 
trol  exercised  by  law-givers  over  monetary  systems — and 
so  completely  have  men  come  to  regard  this  control  as  a 
matter  of  course,  that  scarcely  any  one  seems  to  inquire 
what  would  result  were  it  abolished.  Perhaps  in  no  case 
is  the  necessity  of  state-superintendence  so  generally  as 
sumed  ;  and  in  no  case  will  the  denial  of  that  necessity 
cause  so  much  surprise.  Yet  must  the  denial  be  made. 


DISTURBING   THE   EIGHT   OF   EXCHANGE.  433 

That  laws  interfering  with  currency  cannot  be  enacted 
without  a  reversal  of  state-duty  is  obvious  ;  for  to  either 
forbid  the  issue  or  enforce  the  receipt  of  certain  notes  or 
coin  in  return  for  other  things,  is  tosjnfringe  the  right  of 
exchange— is  to  prevent  men  making  exchanges  which 
they  otherwise  would  have  made,  or  to  oblige  them  to 
make  exchanges  which  they  otherwise  would  not  have 
madeyMs,  therefore,  to  break  the  law  of  equal  freedom 
in  their  persons  (Chap.  XXIII.).  /  If  there  be  truth  in  our 
general  principle,  it  must  be  impolitic  as  well  as  wrong  to 
do  this.  Nor  will  those  who  infer  as  much  be  deceived ; 
for  it  may  be  shown  that  all  such  dictation  is  not  only 
needless,  but  necessarily  injurious. 

The  monetary  arrangements  of  any  community  are 
ultimately  dependent,  like  most  of  its  other  arrangements, 
on  the  morality  of  its  members.  Amongst  a  people 
altogether  dishonest,  every  mercantile  transaction  must 
be  effected  in  coin  or  goods ;  for  promises  to  pay  cannot 
circulate  at  all,  where,  by  the  hypothesis,  there  is  no 
probability  that  they  will  be  redeemed.  Conversely, 
amongst  perfectly  honest  people  paper  alone  will  form  the 
circulating  medium ;  seeing  that  as  no  one  of  such  will 
give  promises  to  pay  more  than  his  assets  will  cover,  there 
can  exist  no  hesitation  to  receive  promises  to  pay  in  all 
cases ;  and  metallic  money  will  be  needless,  save  in  nomi 
nal  amount  to  supply  a  measure  of  value.  Manifestly, 
therefore,  during  any  intermediate  state,  in  which  men 
are  neither  altogether  dishonest  nor  altogether  honest,  a 
mixed  currency  will  exist ;  and  the  ratio  of  paper  to  coin 
will  vary  with  the  degree  of  trust  individuals  can  place  in 
each  other.  There  seems  no  evading  this  conclusion. 
The  greater  the  prevalence  of  fraud,  the  greater  will  be 
the  number  of  transactions  in  which  the  seller  will  part 
with  his  goods  only  for  an  equivalent  of  intrinsic  value  ; 
that  is,  the  greater  will  be  the  number  of  transactions  in 
19 


434:  CUKKENCY,  POSTAL   ARRANGEMENTS,  ETC. 

which  coin  is  required,  and  the  more  will  the  metallic  cur 
rency  preponderate.  On  the  other  hand,  the  more  gener 
ally  men  find  each  other  trustworthy,  the  more  frequently 
will  they  take  payment  in  notes,  bills  of  exchange,  and 
checks ;  the  fewer  will  be  the  cases  -in  which  gold  and  sil 
ver  are  called  for,  and  the  smaller  will  be  the  quantity  of 
gold  and  silver  in  circulation. 

Thus,  self-regulating  as  is  a  currency  when  let  alone, 
laws  cannot  improve  its  arrangements,  although  they  may, 
and  continually  do,  derange  them.  That  the  state  should 
compel  every  one  who  has  given  promises  to  pay,  be  he 
merchant,  private  banker,  or  shareholder  in  a  joint-stock 
bank,  duly  to  discharge  the  responsibilities  he  has  in 
curred,  is  very  true.  To  do  this,  however,  is  merely  to 
maintain  men's  rights — to  administer  justice;  and  there 
fore  comes  within  the  state's  normal  function.  But  to  do 
more  than  this — to  restrict  issues,  or  forbid  notes  below  a 
certain  denomination,  is  no  less  injurious  than  inequitable. 
For,  limiting  the  paper  in  circulation  to  an  amount  smaller 
than  it  would  otherwise  reach,  inevitably  necessitates  a 
corresponding  increase  of  coin ;  and  as  coin  is  locked-up 
capital,  on  which  the  nation  gets  no  interest,  a  needless 
increase  of  it  is  equivalent  to  an  additional  tax  equal  to 
the  additional  interest  lost. 

Moreover,  even  under  such  restrictions,  men  must  still 
depend  mainly  upon  each  other's  good  faith  and  enlight 
ened  self-interest ;  seeing  that  only  by  requiring  the  banker 
to  keep  sufficient  specie  in  his  coffers  to  cash  all  the  notes 
he  has  issued,  can  complete  security  be  given  to  the  hold 
ers  of  them ;  and  to  require  as  much  is  to  destroy  the  mo 
tive  for  issuing  notes.  It  should  be  remembered,  too,  that 
even  now  the  greater  part  of  our  paper  currency  is  wholly 
unguaranteed.  Over  the  bills  of  exchange  in  circulation,* 

*  Though  not  literally  currency,  bills  of  exchange,  serving  in  many 


THE   SCOTCH    CURRENCY    SYSTEM.  435 

which  represent  liabilities  three  times  as  great  as  are  rep 
resented  by  notes,  no  control  is  exercised.  For  the  honour 
ing  of  these  there  exists  no  special  security  and  the  mul 
tiplication  of  them  is  without  any  limit,  save  that  natural 
one  above  mentioned — the  credit  men  find  it  safe  to  give 
each  other. 

Lastly,  we  have  experience  completely  to  the  point. 
Whilst  in  England  banking  has  been  perpetually  con 
trolled,  now  by  privileging  the  Bank  of  England,  now  by 
limiting  banking  partnerships,  now  by  prohibiting  banks 
of  issue  within  a  specified  circle,  and  now  by  restricting 
the  amounts  issued — whilst  "  we  have  never  rested  for 
many  years  together  without  some  new  laws,  some  new 
regulations,  dictated  by  the  fancy  and  theory  fashionable 
at  particular  periods  "  * — and  whilst  "  by  constant  inter 
ference  we  have  prevented  public  opinion,  and  the  expe 
rience  of  bankers  themselves,  adapting  and  moulding  their 
business  to  the  best  and  safest  course "  f — there  has  ex 
isted  in  Scotland  for  nearly  two  centuries  a  wholly  uncon 
trolled  system — a  complete  free-trade  in  currency.  And 
what  have  been  the  comparative  results?  Scotland  has 
had  the  advantage,  both  in  security  and  economy.  The 
gain  in  security  is  proved  by  the  fact  that  the  proportion 
of  bank  failures  in  Scotland  has  been  far  less  than  in  Eng. 
land.  Though  "  by  law  there  has  never  been  any  restric 
tion  against  any  one  issuing  notes  in  Scotland ;  yet,  in 
practice,  it  has  ever  been  impossible  for  any  unsound  or 
unsafe  paper  to  obtain  currency."  J  And  thus  the  natural 
guarantee  in  the  one  case  has  been  more  efficient  than  the 
legislative  one  in  the  other.  The  gain  in  economy  is 
proved  by  the  fact  that  Scotland  has  carried  on  its  busi- 

cases  to  effect  mercantile  transactions  which  would  otherwise  be  effected  in 
money,  to  that  extent  perform  its,function. 

*  Capital,  Currency,  and  Banking.    By  Jarnes  Wilson,  Esq.,  M.  P. 

\  Ibid.  %  Ibid. 


436 

ness  with  a  circulation  of  £3,500,000,  whilst  in  England 
the  circulation  is  from  £50,000,000  to  £60,000,000 ;  or,  al 
lowing  for  difference  of  population,  England  has  required 
a  currency  three  times  greater  than  Scotland.  *~/ 

.  When,  therefore,  we  find  d  priori  reason  for  concluding 
that  in  any  given  community  the  due  balance  between 
paper  and  coin  will  be  spontaneously  maintained — when 
we  also  find  that  three-fourths  of  our  own  paper  circula 
tion  is  self-regulated — that  the  restrictions  on  the  other 
fourth  entail  a  useless  sinking  of  capital — and  further,  that 
facts  prove  a  self-regulated  system  to  be  both  safer  and 
cheaper,  we  may  fairly  say,  as  above,  that  legislative  in 
terference  is  not  only  needless  but  injurious.^ 

If  evil  arises  when  the  state  takes  upon  itself  to  regu 
late,  currency,  so  also  does  evil  arise  when  it  turns  banker. 
True,  no  direct  breach  of  duty  is  committed  in  issuing 
notes; 'for  the  mere  transfer  of  promises  to  pay  to  those 
who  will  take  them,  necessitates  neither  infringement  of 
men's  rights  nor  the  raising  of  taxes  for  illegitimate  pur 
poses.  And  did  the  state  confine  itself  to  this,  no  harm 
would  result  j/  but  when  as  in  practice,  it  makes  its  notes, 
or,  rather,  those  of  its  proxy,  legal  tender,  fa  both  violates 
the  law  of  equal  freedom,  and  opens  the  door  to  abuses 
that  were  else  impossible.  ^.Having  enacted  that  its  agent's 
promises  to  pay  shall  be  taken  in  discharge  of  all  claims 
between  man  and  man,  there  readily  follows,  when  occa 
sion  calls,  the  further  step  of  enacting  that  these  promises 
to  pay  shall  be  taken  in  discharge  of  all  claims  on  its 
agent.  This  done,  further  liabilities  are  incurred  without 
difficulty,  for  they  can  be  liquidated  in  paper.  Paper  con 
tinues  to  be  issued  without  limit,  and  then  comes  depre 
ciation  ;'  which  depreciation  is  virtually  an  additional  tax 
ation,  imposed  without  the  popular  consent — a  taxation 
which,  if  directly  imposed,  would  make  men  realize  the 
extravagance  of  their  national  expenditure,  and  condemn 


EVILS   OF   STATE-BANKING.  437 

the  war  necessitating  it.  Seeing,  then,  that  there  could 
never  occur  depreciation,  and  its  concomitant  evils,  were 
there  no  notes  made  inconvertible  by  act  of  parliament — 
and  seeing  that  there  could  never  exist  any  motive  to 
make  notes  legally  inconvertible,  save  for  purposes  of 
state-banking — there  is  good  reason  to  consider  state-bank 
ing  injurious.  Should  it  be  urged  that,  for  the  occasional 
evils  it  entails,  state-banking  more  than  compensates  by 
the  habitual  supply  of  many  millions'  worth  of  notes, 
whose  place  could  not  be  supplied  by  other  notes  of  equal 
credit,  it  is  replied  that  had  the  Bank  of  England  no  al 
liance  with  the  state,*  its  notes  would  still  circulate  as 
extensively  as  now,  provided  its  proprietors  continued 
their  solicitude  (so  constantly  shown  at  the  half-yearly 
meetings)  to  keep  their  assets  more  than  three  millions 
above  their  liabilities. 

There  is  a  third  capacity  in  which  a  government  usually 
stands  related  to  the  currency,  viz.,  as  a  manufacturer  of 
coins.  That  in  theory  a  government  may  carry  on  the 
trade  of  stamping  bullion  without  necessarily  reversing 
its  proper  function,  is  admitted.  Practically,  however,  it 
never  does  so  without  collaterally  transgressing.  For  the 
same  causes  which  prevent  it  from  profitably  competing 
with  private  individuals  in  other  trades,  must  prevent  it 
from  profitably  competing  with  them  in  this — a  truth 
which  inquiry  into  the  management  of  the  mint  will  suffi 
ciently  enforce.  And  if  so,  a  government  can  manufac 
ture  coins  without  loss,  only  by  forbidding  every  one  else 
to  manufacture  them.  By  doing  this,  however,  it  dimin 
ishes  men's  liberty  of  action  in  the  same  way  as  by 

*  The  alliance  consists  in  this,  that  on  the  credit  of  a  standing  debt  of 
£14,000,000,  due  from  the  Government  to  the  Bank,  the  Bank  is  allowed 
to  issue  notes  to  that  amount  (besides  further  notes  on  other  security),  and 
hence  to  the  extent  of  this  debt  the  notes  have  practically  a  Government 
guarantee. 


4:38  CURRENCY,  POSTAL   ARRANGEMENTS,  ETC. 

any  other  trade  restriction — in  short,  does  wrong.  And, 
ultimately,  the  breach  of  the  law  of  equal  freedom  thus 
committed  results  in  society  having  to  pay  more  for 
its  metallic  currency  than  would  otherwise  be  neces 
sary. 

Perhaps  to  many  it  will  seem  that  by  a  national  mint 
alone  can  the  extensive  diffusion  of  spurious  coinage  be 
prevented.  But  those  who  suppose  this,  forget  that  un 
der  a  natural  system  there  would  exist  the  same  safe 
guards  against  such  an  evil  as  at  present.  The  ease  with 
which  bad  money  is  distinguished  from  good,  is  the  ulti 
mate  guarantee  for  genuineness ;  and  this  guarantee  would 
be  as  efficient  then  as  now.  Moreover,  whatever  addi 
tional  security  arises  from  the  punishment  of  "  smashers  " 
would  still  be  afforded;  seeing  that  to  bring  to  justice 
those  who  by  paying  in  base  coin  obtain  goods  "  under 
false  pretences,"  comes  within  the  state's  duty.  Should 
it  be  urged  that  in  the  absence  of  legislative  regulations 
there  would  be  nothing  to  prevent  makers  from  issuing 
new  mintages  of  various  denominations  and  degrees  of 
fineness,  the  reply  is  that  only  when  some  obvious  public 
advantage  was  to  be  obtained  by  it,  could  a  coin  differing 
from  current  ones  get  into  circulation.  i,Were  private 
mints  now  permitted,  the  proprietors  of  them  would  be 
obliged  to  make  their  sovereigns  like  existing  ones,  be 
cause  no  others  would  be  taken.  For  the  size  and  weight 
— they  would  be  tested  by  gauge  and  balance,  as  now 
(and  for  a  while  with  great  caution).  For  the  fineness — 
it  would  be  guaranteed  by  the  scrutiny  of  other  makers. 
Competing  ^firms  would  assay  each  other's  issues  when 
ever  there  appeared  the  least  reason  to  think  them  below 
the  established  standard,  and  should  their  suspicions  prove 
correct,  would  quickly  find  some  mode  of  diffusing  the 
information.  Probably  a  single  case  of  exposure  and  the 


PEIVATE   COIN-MANUFACTURE.  439 

consequent  ruin,  would  ever  after  prevent  attempts  to  cir 
culate  coins  of  inferior  fineness.* 

It  is  not  unlikely  that  many  readers,  though,  unpre 
pared  with  definite  replies  to  these  reasonings,  will  still 
doubt  their  correctness.  That  the  existing  monetary  sys 
tem — an  actual  working  system,  seemingly  kept  going  by 
the  state — would  be  benefited  by  the  withdrawal  of  state- 
control,  is  a  belief  which  the  strongest  arguments  will  in 
most  cases  fail  to  instil.  Custom  will  bias  men  in  this 
case,  much  as  in  another  case  it  does  the  vine-growers  of 
France,  who,  having  long  been  instructed  by  state-com 
missioned  authorities  when  to  commence  the  vintage,  be 
lieve  that  such  dictation  is  beneficial.  So  much  more  does 
a  realized  fact  influence  us  than  an  imagined  one,  that  had 
the  baking  and  sale  of  bread  been  hitherto  carried  on  by 
government-agents,  probably  the  supply  of  bread  by  pri 
vate  enterprise  would  scarcely  be  conceived  possible, 
much  less  advantageous.  The  philosophical  free-trader, 
however,  remembering  this  efiect  of  habit  over  the  con 
victions — remembering  how  innumerable  have  been  the 
instances  in  which  legislative  control  was  erroneously 
thought  necessary — remembering  that  in  this  very  matter 
of  currency  men  once  considered  it  requisite  "  to  use  the 
most  ferocious  measures  to  bring  as  much  foreign  bullion 
as  possible  into  the  country,  and  to  prevent  any  going 
out" — remembering  how  that  interference,  like  others, 
proved  not  only  needless  but  injurious — remembering  thus 
much,  the  philosophical  free-trader  will  infer  that  in  the 

*  Whilst  these  sheets  are  passing  through  the  press,  facts,  which  he  is 
not  now  at  liberty  to  quote,  have  been  communicated  to  the  writer,  conclu 
sively  proving  the  superior  economy  of  a  coin-manufacture  conducted  by 
private  individuals ;  together  with  other  facts  suggesting  the  obvious  truth 
that  the  debasement  of  coinage,  from  which  our  forefathers  suffered  so 
much,  was  made  possible  only  by  legal  compulsion — would  never  have  been 
possible  had  the  currency  been  left  to  itself. 


4:4:0  CURRENCY,  POSTAL   ARRANGEMENTS,  ETC. 

present  instance  also,  legislative  control  is  undesirable. 
Reasons  for  considering  trade  in  money  an  exception  to 
the  general  rule,  will  weigh  but  little  with  him ;  for  he 
will  recollect  that  similar  reasons  have  been  assigned  for 
restricting  various  trades,  and  disproved  by  the  results. 
Rather  will  he  conclude  that  as,  in  spite  of  all  prophecies 
and  appearances  to  the  contrary,  entire  freedom  of  ex 
change  has  been  beneficial  in  other  cases,  so,  despite  simi 
lar  prophecies  and  adverse  appearances,  will  it  be  benefi 
cial  in  this  case. % 

§  2.  What  was  lately  said  respecting  the  stamping 
of  bullion  may  here  be  repeated  respecting  the  carrying 
of  letters,  viz.,  that  it  is  not  intrinsically  at  variance  with 
state-duty;  for  it  does  not  in  the  abstract  necessitate  any 
infringement  of  men's  rights,  eith£^  directly,  or  by  taxes 
raised  for  non-protective  purposes.  /Nevertheless,  just  as 
we  found  reason  to  think  that  government  could  not  con 
tinue  to  manufacture  coin  unless  by  preventing  private 
individuals  from  doing  the  same,  we  shall  also  find  reason 
to  think  that  it  would  cease  Jo  carry  letters  did  it  not  for 
bid  competition.  And  if  so;  a  government  cannot  under 
take  postal  functions  without  reversing  its  essential  func 
tion. 

Evidence  that  private  enterprise  would  supersede  state- 
agency  in  this  matter,  were  it  allowed  the  opportunity,  is 
deducible  not  only  from  our  general  experience  of  the  in 
feriority  of  government  in  the  capacity  of  manufacturer, 
trader,  or  manager  of  business,  but  from  facts  immediately 
bearing  upon  the  question.  Thus  we  must  remember  that 
the  efficiency  to  which  our  postal  system  has  actually  at 
tained  is  not  due  to  its  being  under  public  administration, 
but  is  due  to  pressure  from  without.  Changes  have  been 
forced  upon  the  authorities,  not  introduced  by  them.  "^The 
mail-coach  system  was  established,  and  for  a  length  of 


*-    l 

jar  TH: 


COMPETITION   IN   LETTER-CARRYING.      \v      S&4bl 

time  managed,  by  a  private  individual,  and  lived 
official  opposition.  The  reform  originated  by  Mr.  Row 
land  Hill  was  strenuously  resisted ;  and  it  is  generally  re 
ported  that  even  now,  official  perversity  prevents  his  plans 
from  being  fully  carried  out.  Whereas,  seeing  that  the 
speculative  spirit  of  trade  is  not  only  ready,  but  eager  to 
satisfy  social  wants,  it  is  probable  that  under  a  natural 
state  of  things  modern  postal  improvements  would  have 
been  willingly  adopted,  if  not  forestalled.  Should  it  be 
alleged  that  private  enterprise  would  not  be  competent 
to  so  gigantic  an  undertaking,  it  is  replied  that  already 
there  are  extensive  organizations  of  analogous  character 
which  work  well.  The  establishments  of  our  large  car 
riers  ramify  throughout  the  whole  kingdom;  whilst  we 
have  a  Parcels'  Delivery  Company,  coextensive  in  its 
sphere  with  the  London  District  Post,  and  quite  as  effi 
cient.  Private  agencies  for  communicating  information 
beat  public  ones  even  now,  wherever  they  are  permitted 
to  compete  with  them. "  The  foreign  expresses  of  our  daily 
papers  are  uniformly  before  the  government  expresses. 
Copies  of  a  royal  speech,  or  statements  of  an  important 
vote,  are  diffused  throughout  the  country  by  the  press, 
with  a  rapidity  exceeding  that  even  achieved  by  the  Post 
Office ;  and  if  expedition  is  shown  in  the  stamping  and 
sorting  of  letters,  it  is  far  surpassed  by  the  expedition  of 
parliamentary  reporting.  Moreover,  much  of  the  postal 
service  itself  is  already  performed  by  private  agency. 
Not  only  are  our  internal  mails  carried  by  contract,  but 
nearly  all  our  external  ones  also ;  and  where  they  are  car 
ried  by  government  they  are  carried  at  a  great  loss.  In 
proof  of  which  assertion  it  needs  but  to  quote  the  fact 
that  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental  Steam  Navigation  Com 
pany  offers  to  secure  for  us  a  direct  monthly  communica 
tion  with  Australia ;  two  communications,  monthly,  from 
Southampton  to  Alexandria;  two  communications,  month- 
19* 


CUKKENCY,  POSTAL   AKKANGEMENTS,  ETC. 

ly,  from  Suez  to  Ceylon,  Singapore,  and  China ;  and  two 
communications,  monthly,  from  Calcutta  to  Singapore  and 
China ;  besides  performing  the  service  twice  a  month  be 
tween  Suez  and  Bombay,  and  all  for  the  same  sum  of 
money  which  the  latter  service  alone  (Suez  to  Bombay) 
now  costs  the  governments  of  India  and  Great  Britain. 

If,  then,  public  letter-carrying  has  been  brought  to  its 
existing  efficiency  by  the  thought,  enterprise,  and  urgency 
of  private  persons,  in  spite  of  official  resistance — if  organ 
izations  similar  to  our  postal  ones  already  exist  and  work 
well — if,  as  conveyers  of  intelligence  by  other  modes  than 
the  mail,  trading  bodies  uniformly  excel  the  state — if  much 
of  the  mail  service  itself  is  performed  by  such  trading 
bodies,  and  that,  too,  on  the  largest  scale,  with  incompar 
ably,  greater  economy  than  the  state  can  perform  it  with — 
there  is  nothing  unreasonable  in  the  conclusion  that,  were 
it  permitted,  commercial  enterprise  would  generate  a  let 
ter-carrying  system  as  efficient  as,  if  not  more  efficient 
than,  our  present  one.  It  is  true  that  many  obstacles 
stand  in  the  way  of  such  a  result.  But  because  it  is  now 
scarcely  possible  to  see  our  way  over  these,  it  does  not  at 
all  follow  that  they  may  not  be  surmounted.  There  are 
moral  inventions,  as  well  as  physical  ones.  And  it  fre 
quently  happens  that  the  instrumentalities  which  ulti 
mately  accomplish  certain  social  desiderata,  are  as  little 
foreseen  as  are  the  mechanical  appliances  of  one  genera 
tion  by  the  previous  one.  Take  the  Railway  Clearing 
House  for  an  example.  Hence  it  is  not  too  much  to  ex 
pect  that  under  the  pressure  of  social  necessity,  and  the 
stimulus  of  self-interest,  satisfactory  modes  of  meeting  all 
such  difficulties  would  be  discovered. 

However,  any  doubts  which  may  still  be  entertained 
on  the  point  do  not  militate  against  our  general  principle. 
It  is  clear  that  the  restriction  put  upon  the  liberty  of  trade, 
by  forbidding  private  letter-carrying  establishments,  is  a 


^v  *&- 


CONSTRUCTION   OF   PUBLIC   WORKS. 
S<  -  '? 

breach  of  state-duty.  It  is  also  clear  that  were  that  re 
striction  abolished,  a  natural  postal  system  would  event 
ually  grow  up,  could  it  surpass  in  efficiency  our  existing 
one.  And  it  is  further  clear  that  if  it  could  not  surpass 
it,  the  existing  system  might  rightly  continue ;  for,  as  at 
first  said,  the  fulfilment  of  postal  functions  by  the  state  is 
not  intrinsically  at  variance  with  the  fulfilment  of  its  es 
sential  function. 

§  3.  The  execution  by  government  of  what  are 
commonly  called  public  works,  as  lighthouses,  harbours 
of  refuge,  &c.,  implying,  as  it  does,  the  imposition  of 
taxes  for  other  purposes  than  maintaining  men's  rights,  is 
as  much  forbidden  by  our  definition  of  state-duty  as  is  a 
system  of  national  education,  or  a  religious  establishment. 
Nor  is  this  unavoidable  inference  really  an  inconvenient 
one ;  however  much  it  may  at  first  seem  so.  The  agency 
by  which  these  minor  wants  of  society  are  now  satisfied, 
is  not  the  only  agency  competent  to  satisfy  them.  Wher 
ever  there  exists  a  want,  there  will  also  exist  an  impulse 
to  get  it  fulfilled,  and  this  impulse  is  sure,  eventually,  to 
produce  action.  In  the  present  case,  as  in  others,  that 
which  is  beneficial  to  the  community  as  a  whole,  it  will 
become  the  private  interest  of  some  part  of  the  commu 
nity  to  accomplish.  And  as  this  private  interest  has  been 
so  efficient  a  provider  of  roads,  canals,  and  railways,  there 
is  no  reason  why  it  should  not  be  an  equally  efficient  pro 
vider  of  harbours  of  refuge,  lighthouses,  and  all  analogous 
appliances.  Even  were  there  no  classes  whose  private  in 
terests  would  be  obviously  subserved  by  executing  such 
works,  this  inference  might  still  be  defended.  But  there 
are  such  classes.  Ship-owners  and  merchants  have  a  di 
rect  and  ever-waking  motive  to  diminish  the  dangers  of 
navigation ;  and  were  they  not  taught  by  custom  to  look 
for  state-aid,  would  themselves  quickly  unite  to  establish 


-7s 


4:4:4:  CURRENCY,  POSTAL   ARRANGEMENTS,  ETC. 

safeguards.  Or,  possibly,  they  would  be  anticipated  by  a 
combination  of  Marine  Insurance  Offices  (themselves  pro 
tective  institutions,  originated  by  self-interest).  But  in 
evitably,  in  some  way  or  other,  the  numerousness  of  the 
parties  concerned,  and  the  largeness  of  the  capital  at  stake, 
would  guarantee  the  taking  of  all  requisite  precautions. 
That  enterprise  which  built  the  docks  of  London,  Liver 
pool,  and  Birkenhead — which  is  enclosing  the  Wash — 
which  so  lately  bridged  the  Atlantic  by  steam — and  which 
is  now  laying  down  the  electric  telegraph  across  the  Chan 
nel — might  safely  be  trusted  to  provide  against  the  con 
tingencies  of  coast  navigation. 


7 
^ 


PAET    IV 


• 


CHAPTEE    XXX. 

GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

§  1.  Social  Philosophy  may  be  aptly  divided  (as  po 
litical  economy  has  been)  into  statics  and  dynamics  ;*  the 
first  treating  of  the  equilibrium  of  a  perfect  society,  the 
second  of  the  forces  by  which  society  is  advanced  toward 
perfection.  To  determine  what  laws  we  must  obey  for 
the  obtainment  of  complete  happiness  is  the  object  of  the 
one,  whilst  that  of  the  other  is  to  analyze  the  influences 
which  are  making  us  competent  to  obey  these  laws.  /  Hith 
erto  we  have  concerned  ourselves  chiefly  with  the  statics, 
touching  upon  the  dynamics  only  occasionally  for  pur 
poses  of  elucidation.  Now,  however,  the  dynamics  claim 
special  attention.  Some  of  the  phenomena  of  progress  al 
ready  referred  to  need  further  explanation,  and  many  oth 
ers  associated  with  them  remain  to  be  noticed.  There  are 
also  sundry  general  considerations  not  admissible  into  fore 
going  chapters,  which  may  here  be  fitly  included. 

§  2.  And  first  let  us  mark,  that  ;the  course  of  civili 
zation  could  not  possibly  have  been  other  than  it  has 
been,/  Whether  a  perfect  social  state  might  have  been  at 
orice  established ;  and  why,  if  it  might  have  been,  it  was 
not — why  for  unnumbered  ages  the  world  was  filled  with 
inferior  creatures  only — and  why  mankind  were  left  to 
make  it  fit  for  human  life  by  clearing  it  of  these — are 
questions  that  need  not  be  discussed  here.  But  given  an 
unsubdued  earth;  given  the  being — man,  appointed  to 
overspread  and  occupy  it;  given  the  laws  of  life  what 


4:48  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

they  are ;  and  no  other  series  of  changes  than  that  which 
has  taken  place,  could  have  taken  place. 

For  be  it  remembered,  that  the  ultimate  purpose  of 
creation — the  production  of  the  greatest  amount  of  hap 
piness — can  be  fulfilled  only  under  certain  fixed  conditions 
(p.  83).  Each  member  of  the  race  fulfilling  it,  must  not 
only  be  endowed  with  faculties  enabling  him  to  receive 
the  highest  enjoyment  in  the  act  of  living,  but  must  be  so 
constituted  that  he  may  obtain  full  satisfaction  for  every 
desire,  without  diminishing  the  power  of  others  to  obtain 
like  satisfaction :  nay,  to  fulfil  the  purpose  perfectly,  must 
derive  pleasure  from  seeing  pleasure  in  others.  Now,  for 
beings  thus  constituted  to  multiply  in  a  world  already  ten 
anted  by  inferior  creatures — creatures  that  must  be  dis 
possessed  to  make  room — is  a  manifest  impossibility.  By 
the  definition  such  beings  must  lack  all  desire  to  extermi 
nate  the  races  they  are  to  supplant.  They  must,  indeed, 
have  a  repugnance  to  exterminating  them,  for  the  ability 
to  derive  pleasure  from  seeing  pleasure,  involves  the  lia 
bility  to  pain  from  seeing  pain :  the  sympathy  by  which 
either  of  these  .results  is  effected,  simply  having  for  its 
function  to  reproduce  observed  emotions,  irrespective  of 
their  kind.  Evidently,  therefore,  having  no  wish  to  de 
stroy — to  destroy  giving  them,  on  the  contrary,  disagreea 
ble  sensations — these  hypothetical  beings,  instead  of  sub 
jugating  and  overspreading  the  earth,  must  themselves 
become  the  prey  of  preexisting  creatures,  in  whom  de 
structive  desires  predominate.  How  then  are  the  circum 
stances  of  the  case  to  be  met  ?  Evidently  the  aboriginal 
man  must  have  a  constitution  adapted  to  the  work  he  has 
to  perform,  joined  with  a  dormant  capability  of  develop 
ing  into  the  ultimate  man  when  the  conditions  of  exist 
ence  permit.  To  the  end  that  he  may  prepare  the  earth 
for  its  future  inhabitants — his  descendants,  he  must  pos 
sess  a  character  fitting  him  to  clear  it  of  races  endanger- 


FUNCTION   AND   NECESSITY   OF   THE    SAVAGE.         44:9 

ing  his  life,  and  -races  occupying  the  space  required  by 
mankind.  Hence  he  must  have  a  desire  to  kill,  for  it  is 
the  universal  law  of  life  that  to  every  needful  act  must 
attach  a  gratification,  the  desire  for  which  may  serve  as  a 
stimulus  ;(p.  30).  He  must  further  be  devoid  of  sympa 
thy,  or  must  have  but  the  germ  of  it,  for  he  would  other 
wise  be  incapacitated  for  his  destructive  office.  In  other 
words,  he  must  be  what  we  call  a  savage,  and  must  be 
left  to  acquire  fitness  for  social  life  as  fast  as  the  conquest 
of  the  earth  renders  social  life  possible. 

Whoever  thinks  that  a  thoroughly-civilized  community 
could  be  formed  out  of  men  qualified  to  wage  war  with 
the  preexisting  occupants  of  the  earth — that  is,  whoever 
thinks  that  men  might  behave  sympathetically  to  their 
fellows,  whilst  behaving  unsympathetically  to  inferior 
creatures,  will  discover  his  error  on  looking  at  the  facts. 
'He  will  find  that  human  beings  are  cruel  to  one  another,  k 
in  proportion  as  their  habits  are  predatory.  The  Indian, 
whose  life  is  spent  in  the  chase,  delights  in  torturing  his 
brother  man  as  much  as  in  killing  game.  His  sons  are 
schooled  into  fortitude  by  long  days  of  torment,  and  his 
squaw  made  prematurely  old  by  hard  treatment.  The 
treachery  and  vindictiveness  which  Bushmen  or  Austral 
ians  show  to  one  another  and  to  Europeans,  are  accompa 
niments  of  that  never-ceasing  enmity  existing  between 
them  and  the  denizens  of  the  wilderness.  Amongst  par 
tially-civilized  nations  the  two  characteristics  have  ever 
borne  the  same  relationship.  Thus  the  spectators  in  the 
Roman  amphitheatres  were  as  much  delighted  by  the 
slaying  of  gladiators  as  by  the  death-struggles  of  wild 
beasts.  The  ages  during  which  Europe  was  thinly  peo 
pled,  and  hunting  a  chief  occupation,  were  also  the  ages 
of  feudal  violence,  universal  brigandage,  dungeons,  tor 
tures.  Here  in  England  a  whole  province  depopulated  to 
make  game  preserves,  and  a  law  sentencing  to  death  the 


450  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

serf  who  killed  a  stag,  show  how  great  activity  of  the 
predatory  instinct  and  utter  indifference  to  human  happi 
ness  coexisted.^  In  later  days,  when  bull-baiting  and  cock- 
fighting  were  common  pastimes,  the  penal  code  was  far 
more  severe  than  now ;  prisons  were  full  of  horrors ;  men 
put  in  the  pillory  were  maltreated  by  the  populace ;  and 
the  inmates  of  lunatic  asylums,  chained  naked  to  the  wall, 
were  exhibited  for  money,  and  tormented  for  the  amuse 
ment  of  visitors.  Conversely,  amongst  ourselves  a  desire 
to  diminish  human  misery  is  accompanied  by  a  desire  to 
ameliorate  the  condition  of  inferior  creatures.  )Whilst  the 
kindlier  feeling  of  men  is  seen  in  all  varieties  of  philan 
thropic  effort,  in  charitable  societies,  in  associations  for 
improving  the  dwellings  of  the  labouring  classes,  in  anx 
iety  for  popular  education,  in  attempts  to  abolish  capital 
punishment,  in  zeal  for  temperance  reformation,  in  ragged 
schools,  in  endeavours  to  protect  climbing  boys,  in  inqui 
ries  concerning  "labour  and  the  poor,"  in  emigration  funds, 
in  the  milder  treatment  of  children,  and  so  on,  it  also 
shows  itself  in  societies  for  the  preA^ention  of  cruelty  to 
animals,  in  acts  of  parliament  to  put  down  the  use  of  dogs 
for  purpose  of  draught,  in  the  condemnation  of  steeple 
chases  and  battues,  in  the  late  inquiry  why  the  pursuers 
of  a  stag  should  not  be  punished  as  much  as  the  carter 
who  maltreats  his  horse,  and  lastly,  in  vegetarianism. 
Moreover,  to  make  the  evidence  complete,  we  have  the 
fact  that  men,  partially  adapted  to  the  social  state,  retro 
grade  on  being  placed  in  circumstances  which  call  forth 
the  old  propensities.  The  barbarizing  of  colonists,  who 
live  under  aboriginal  conditions,  is  universally  remarked. 
The  back  settlers. of  America,  amongst  whom  unavenged 
murders,  rifle  duels,  and  Lynch  law  prevail— or,  better 
still,  the  trappers,  who  leading  a  savage  life  have  descended 
to  savage  habits,  to  scalping,  and  occasionally  even  to 
cannibalism — sufficiently  exemplify  it. 


COMMON  ROOT  OF  THE  CRUEL  PROPENSITIES.    451 

But,  indeed,  without  collecting  from  so  wide  a  field, 
illustrations  of  the  truth  that  the  behaviour  of  men  to  the 
lower  animals  and  their  behaviour  to  each  other,  bear  a 
constant  relationship,  it  becomes  clear  that  such  is  the 
fact,  on  observing  that  the  same  impulses  govern  in  either 
case.  The  blind  desire  to  inflict  suifering,  distinguishes 
not  between  the  creatures  who  exhibit  that  suffering,  but 
obtains  gratification  indifferently  from  the  agonies  of  beast 
and  human  being — delights  equally  in  worrying  a  brute, 
and  in  putting  a  prisoner  to  the  rack.  Conversely,  the 
sympathy  which  prevents  its  possessor  from  inflicting  pain, 
that  he  may  avoid  pain  himself,  and  which  tempts  him  to 
give  happiness  that  he  may  have  happiness  reflected  back 
upon  him,  is  similarly  un distinguishing.  As  already  said,  its 
function  is  simply  to  reproduce  in  one  being  the  emotions 
exhibited  by  other  beings ;  and  every  one  must  have  no 
ticed  that  it  extracts  pleasure  from  the  friskiness  of  a 
newly-unchained  dog,  or  excites  pity  for  an  ill-used  beast 
of  burden,  as  readily  as  it  generates  fellow  feeling  with 
the  joys  and  sorrows  of  men. 

So  that  only  by  giving  us  some  utterly  different  men 
tal  constitution  could  the  process  of  civilization  have  been 
altered.  Assume  that  the  creative  scheme  is  to  be 
wrought  out  by  natural  means,  and  it  is  necessary  that 
the  primitive  man  should  be  one  whose  happiness  is 
obtained  at  the  expense  of  the  happiness  of  other  beings. 
It  is  necessary  that  the  ultimate  man  should  be  one  who 
can  obtain  perfect  happiness  without  deducting  from  the 
happiness  of  others.  After  accomplishing  its  appointed 
purpose,  the  first  of  these  constitutions  has  to  be  moulded 
into  the  last.N)  And  the  manifold  evils  which  have  filled 
the  world  for  these  thousands  of  years — the  murders,  en- 
slavings,  and  robberies — the  tyrannies  of  rulers,  the  op 
pressions  of  class,  the  persecutions  of  sect  and  party,  the 
multiform  embodiments  of  selfishness  in  unjust  laws,  bar- 


452  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

/V  *'•-*•  Kr'^S*/'       £//  /  */^  ^  A  "S?  ^ 

barous  customs,  dishonest  dealings,  exclusive  manners, 
and  the  like — are  simply  instances  of  the  disastrous  work 
ing  of  this  original  and  once  needful  constitution,  now 
that  mankind  have  grown  into  conditions  for  which  it  is 
not  fitted — are  nothing  but  symptoms  of  the  suffering 
attendant  upon  the  adaptation  of  humanity  to  its  new  cir 
cumstances. 
•  /:y  '•jp*Wj^*^i'J&****f***#&?  •  ' 

§  3.  But  why,  it  may  be  asked,  has  this  adaptation 
gone  on  so  slowly?  Judging  from  the  rapidity  with 
which  habits  are  formed  in  the  individual,  and  seeing  how 
those  habits,  or  rather  the  latent  tendencies  toward  them, 
become  hereditary,  it  would  seem  that  the  needful  modifi 
cation  should  have  been  completed  long  ago.  How,  then, 
are  we  to  understand  the  delay  ? 

The  answer  is  that  ^he  new  conditions  to  which  adap 
tation  has  been  taking  place  have  themselves  grown  up 
but  slowly,/  Only  when  a  revolution  in  circumstances  is 
at  once  both  marked  and  permanent,  does  a  decisive,  alter 
ation  of  character  follow.  If  the  demand  for  increase  'of 
power  in  some  particular  faculty  is  great  and  unceasing, 
development  will  go  on  with  proportionate  speed.  And, 
conversely,  there  will  be  an  appreciable  dwindling  in  a 
faculty  altogether  deprived  of  exercise.  <vBut  the  condi 
tions  of  human  life  have  undergone  no  changes  sudden 
enough  to  produce  these  immediate  results,/ 

Thus,  note  in  the  first  place,  that  the  warfare  between 
man  and  the  creatures  at  enmity  with  him  has  continued 
up  to  the  present  time,  and  over  a  large  portion  of  the 
globe  is  going  on  now.  Note,  further,  that  where  the 
destructive  propensities  have  almost  fulfilled  their  pur 
pose,  and  are  on  the  eve  of  losing  their  gratification,  they 
make  to  themselves  an  artificial  sphere  of  exercise  by 
game-preserving,  and  are  so  kept  in  activity  after  they 
would  otherwise  have  become  dormant.  But  note, 


DESTRUCTIVE  PROPENSITIES  ARTIFICIALLY  PROLONGED.  453 

chiefly,  that  the  old  predatory  disposition  is  in  a  certain 
sense  self-maintained.  For  it  generates  between  men  and 
men  a  hostile  relationship,  similar  to  that  which  it  gener 
ates  between  men  and  inferior  animals ;  and  by  doing  so 
provides  itself  a  lasting  source  of  excitement.  This  hap 
pens  inevitably.  The  desires  of  the  savage  acting,  as  we 
have  seen,  indiscriminately,  necessarily  lead  him  to  per 
petual  trespasses  against  his  fellows,  and,  consequently,  to 
endless  antagonisms — to  quarrels  of  individuals,  to  fight 
ings  of  tribes,  to  feuds  of  clan  with  clan,  to  wars  of  na 
tions.  And  thus  being  by  their  constitutions  made  mutual 
foes,  as  well  as  foes  to  the  lower  races,  men  keep  alive  in 
each  other  the  old  propensities,  after  the  original  need  for 
theHi  has  in  great  measure  ceased. 

S  Hitherto,  then,  human  character  has  changed  but  ' 
Wowly,  because  it  has  been  subject  to  two  conflicting  sets 
of  conditions.  On  the  one  hand,  the  discipline  of  the 
social  state  has  been  developing  it  into  the  sympathetic 
form ;  whilst  on  the  other  hand,  the  necessity  for  self- 
defence  partly  of  man  against  brute,  partly  of  man  against 
man,  and  partly  of  societies  against  each  other,  has  been 
maintaining  the  old  unsympathetic  form.  And  only 
where  the  influence  of  the  first  set  of  conditions  has  ex 
ceeded  that  of  the  last,  and  then  only  in  proportion  to  the 
excess,  has  modification  taken  place.  J  Amongst  tribes 
who  have  kept  each  other's  anti-social  characteristics  in 
full  activity  by  constant  conflict,  no  advance  has  been 
possible.  But  where  warfare  against  man  and  beast  has 
ceased  to  be  continuous,  or  where  it  has  become  the  em 
ployment  of  but  a  portion  of  the  people,  the  effects  of 
living  in  the  associated  state  have  become  greater  than 
the  effects  of  barbarizing  antagonisms,  and  progress  has 
resulted. 

Regarded  thus,  civilization  no  longer  appears  to  be  a 
regular  unfolding  after  a  specific  plan ;  but  seems  rather  a 


454  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

i  development  of  man's  latent  capabilities  under  the  action 
of  favourable  circumstances;  which  favourable  circum 
stances,  mark,  were  certain  some  time  or  other  to  occur. 
Those  complex  influences  underlying  the  higher  orders  of 
natural  phenomena,  but  more  especially  those  underlying 
the  organic  world,  work  in  subordination  to  the  law  of 

\  probabilities.  A  plant,  for  instance,  produces  thousands 
of  seeds.  The  greater  part  of  these  are  destroyed  by 
creatures  that  live  upon  them,  or  fall  into  places  where 
they  cannot  germinate.  Of  the  young  plants  produced 
by  those  which  do  germinate,  many  are  smothered  by 
their  neighbours ;  others  are  blighted  by  insects,  or  eateu 
up  by  animals ;  and  in  the  average  of  cases,  only  one  of 
them  produces  a  perfect  specimen  of  its  species,  which, 
escaping  all  dangers,  brings  to  maturity  seeds  enough  to 
continue  the  race.  Thus  is  it  also  with  every  kind  of 
creature.  Thus  is  it  also,  as  M.  Quetelet  has  shown, 
with  the  phenomena  of  human  life.  And  thus  wa^  it 

N  even  with  the  germination  and  growth  of  society.  (The 
seeds  of  civilization  existing  in  the  aboriginal  man,  and 
distributed  over  the  earth  by  his  multiplication,  were 
certain  in  the  lapse  of  time  to  fall  here  and  there  into  cir- 
cumstances  fit  for  their  development ;  and,  in  spite  of  all 
blightings  and  uprootings,  were  certain,  by  sufficient 
repetition  of  these  occurrences,  ultimately  to  originate  a 
civilization  which  should  outlive  all  disasters  and  arrive 
at  perfection.- 

\  §  4.  Whilst  the  continuance  of  the  old  predatory 
instinct  after  the  fulfilment  of  its  original  purpose,  has 
retarded  civilization  by  giving  rise  to  conditions  at  vari 
ance  with  those  of  social  life,  it  has  subserved  civilization 
by  clearing  the  earth  of  inferior  race's  of  men.  The  forces 
which  are  Avorking  out  the  great  scheme  of  perfect  happi- 

suffering,  extermi- 


USEFULNESS   OF   THE   PEEDATOEY   INSTINCT.          455 

nate  such  sections  of  mankind  as  stand  in  their  way,  with 
the  same  sternness  that  they  exterminate  beasts  of  prey 
and  herds  of  useless  ruminants.  Be  he  human  being,  or 
be  he  brute,  the  hindrance  must  be  got  rid  of.  .  Just  as 
the  savage  has  taken  the  place  of  lower  creatures,  so  must 
he,  if  he  have  remained  too  long  a  savage,  give  place  to 
his  superior.  And,  observe,  it  is  necessarily  to  his  superior 
that,  in  the  great  majority  of  cases,  he  does  give  place. 
For  what  are  the  prerequisites  to  a  conquering  race? 
Numerical  strength,  or  an  improved  system  of  warfare  ; 
both  of  which  are  indications  of  advancement.  Numerical 
strength  implies  certain  civilizing  antecedents.  Deficiency 
of  game  may  have  necessitated  agricultural  pursuits,  and 
so  made  the  existence  of  a  larger  population  possible ;  or 
distance  from  other  tribes  may  have  rendered  war  less 
frequent,  and  so  have  prevented  its  perpetual  decimations ; 
or  accidental  superiority  over  neighbouring  tribes,  may 
have  led  to  the  final  subjugation  and  enslaving  of  these  : 
in  any  of  which  cases  the  comparatively  peaceful  condi 
tion  resulting,  must  have  allowed  progress  to  commence. 
Evidently,  therefore;  from  the  very  beginning,  the  con 
quest  of  one  people  over  another  has  been,  in  the  main, 
the  conquest  of  the  social  man  over  the  anti-social  man  ; 
or,  strictly  speaking,  of  the  more  adapted  over  the  less 
adapted. 

In  another  mode,  too,  the  continuance  of  the  unsympa 
thetic  character  has  indirectly  aided  civilization  whilst  it 
has  directly  hindered  it ;  namely,  by  giving  rise  to  slavery. 
It  has  been  observed — and,  as  it  seems,  truly  enough — 
that  only  by  such  stringent  coercion  as  is  exercised  over 
men  held  in  bondage,  could  the  needful  power  of  continu 
ous  application  have  been  developed.  Devoid  of  this,  as 
from  his  habits  of  life  the  aboriginal  man  necessarily  was 
(and  as,  indeed,  existing  specimens  show),  probably  the 
severest  discipline  continued  for  many  generations  was 

WVX'  •  < ;/;,"}.//.      /£*V/^    /?&>, 


456  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

required  to  make  him  submit  contentedly  to  the  necessi 
ties  of  his  new  state.  And  if  so,  the  barbarous  selfishness 
which  maintained  that  discipline,  must  be  considered  as 
having  worked  a  collateral  benefit,  though  in  itself  so  radi 
cally  bad. 

Let  not  the  reader  be  alarmed.  Let  him  not  fear  that 
these  admissions  will  excuse  new  invasions  and  new  op 
pressions.  Nor  let  any  one  who  fancies  himself  called 
upon  to  take  Nature's  part  in  this  matter,  by  providing 
discipline  for  idle  negroes  or  others,  suppose  that  these 
dealings  of  the  past  will  serve  for  precedents.  Rightly 
understood,  they  will-  do  no  such  thing.  That  phase  of 
civilization  during  which  forcible  supplantings  of  the  weak 
by  the  strong,  and  systems  of  savage  coercion,  are  on  the 
whole  advantageous,  is  a  phase  which  spontaneously  and 
necessarily  gives  birth  to  these  things.  It  is  not  in  pur 
suance  of  any  calmly-reasoned  conclusions  respecting  na 
ture's  intention  that  men  conquer  and  enslave  their  fel 
lows — it  is  not  that  they  smother  their  kindly  feelings  to 
subserve  civilization ;  but  it  is  that  as  yet  constituted  they 
care  little  what  suffering  they  inflict  in  the  pursuit  of  grat 
ification,  and  even  think  the  achievement  and  exercise  of 
mastery  honourable.  As  soon,  however,  as  there  arises  a 
perception  that  these  subjugations  and  tyrannies  are  not 
right — as  soon  as  the  sentiment  to  which  they  are  repug 
nant  becomes  sufficiently  powerful  to  suppress  them,  it  is 
time  for  them  to  cease.  ^Fhe  question  altogether  hinges 
upon  the  amount  of  moral  sense  possessed  by  men ;  or,  in 
other  words,  upon  the  degree,  of  adaptation  to  the  social 
state  they  have  undergone.  "Unconsciousness  that  there 
is  any  thing  wrong  in  exterminating  inferior  races,  or  in 
reducing  them  to  bondage,  presupposes  an  almost  rudi 
mentary  state  of  men's  sympathies  and  their  sense  of 
human  rights.  The  oppressions  they  then  inflict  and  sub 
mit  to,  are  not,  therefore,  detrimental  to  their  characters — 


SLAVEEY   BELONGS   TO   THE    SAVAGE    STATE.          457 

do  not  retard  in  them  the  growth  of  the  social  sentiments, 
for  these  have  not  yet  reached  a  development  great  enough 
to  be  offended  by  such  doings.  And  hence  the  aids  given 
to  civilization  by  clearing  the  earth  of  its  least  advanced 
inhabitants,  and  by  forcibly  compelling  the  rest  to  acquire 
industrial  habits,  are  given  without  moral  adaptation  re 
ceiving  any  corresponding  check.  Quite  otherwise  is  it, 
however,  when  the  flagitiousness  of  these  gross  forms  of 
injustice  begins  to  be  recognized.  Then  the  times  gives 
proof  that  the  old  regime  is  no  longer  fit.  Further  pro 
gress  cannot  be  made  until  the  newly-felt  wrong  has  been 
done  away  or  diminished.  Were  it  possible  under  such 
circumstances  to  uphold  past  institutions  and  practices 
(which,  happily,  it  is  not),  it  would  be  at  the  expense  of  a 
continual  searing  of  men's  consciences.  The  feelings 
whose  predominance  gives  possibility  to  an  advanced  so 
cial  state  would  be  constantly  repressed — kept  down  on  a 
level  with  the  old  arrangements,  to  the  stopping  of  all 
further  progress ;  and  before  those  who  have  grown  be 
yond  one  of  these  probationary  states  could  reinstitute  it, 
they  must  resume  that  inferior  character  to  which  it  was 
natural.  Before  a  forced  servitude  could  be  again  estab 
lished  for  the  industrial  discipline  of  eight  hundred  thou 
sand  Jamaica  blacks,  the  thirty  millions  of  English  whites 
who  established  it  would  have  to  retrograde  in  all  things 
— in  truthfulness,  fidelity,  generosity,  honesty,  and  even 
in  material  condition ;  for  to  diminish  men's  moral  sense 
is  to  diminish  their  fitness  for  acting  together,  and,  there 
fore,  to  render  the  best  producing  and  distributing  organ 
izations  impracticable.  Another  illustration  this  of  the 
perfect  economy  of  Nature.  Whilst  the.  injustice  of  con 
quests  and  enslavings  is  not  perceived,  they  are  on  the 
whole  beneficial ;  but  as  soon  as  they  are  felt  to  be  at  va 
riance  with  the  moral  law,  the  continuance  of  them  re 
tards  adaptation  in  one  direction,  more  than  it  advances 
20 


458  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

it  in  another :  a  fact  which  our  new  preacher  of  the  old 
doctrine,  that  might  is  right,  may  profitably  consider  a 
little. 

§  5.  Contrasted  as  are  their  units,  primitive  com 
munities  and  advanced  ones  must  essentially  differ  in  the 
principles  of  their  structure.  Like  other  organisms,  the 
social  organism  has  to  pass  in  the  course  of  its  develop 
ment  through  temporary  forms,  in  which  sundry  of  its 
functions  are  fulfilled  by  appliances  destined  to  disappear 
as  fast  as  the  ultimate  appliances  become  efficient.  Asso 
ciated  humanity  has  larvel  appendages  analogous  to  those 
of  individual  creatures.  As  in  the  common  Triton  of  our 
ponds,  the  external  lungs  or  branchia3  dwindle  away  when 
the  internal  lungs  have  grown  to  maturity ;  and  as  during 
the  embryo  stage  of  the  higher  vertebrata,  temporary  or 
gans  appear,  serve  their  purpose  awhile,  and  are  subse 
quently  reabsorbed,  leaving  only  signs  of  their  having 
been;  so,  in  the  earlier  forms  of  the  body  politic  do  there 
exist  institutions  which  after  answering  their  ends  for  a 
time  are  superseded  and  become  extinct. 

But  deciduous  institutions  imply  deciduous  sentiments. 
Dependent  as  they  are  upon  popular  character,  Established 
political  systems  cannot^  die  out  until  the  feeling  which 
upholds  them  dies  out.  /  Hence  during  man's  apprentice 
ship  to  the  social  state  there  must  predominate  in  him 
some  impulse  corresponding  to  the  arrangements  requi 
site  ;  which  impulse  diminishes  as  the  probationary  organ 
ization  made  possible  by  it,  merges  into  the  ultimate  or 
ganization.  The  nature  and  operation  of  this  impulse  now 
demand  our  attention. 

§  6.  "I  had  so  great  a  respect  for  the  memory  of 
Henry  IV.,"  said  the  celebrated  French  robber  and  assas 
sin,  Cartouche,  "  that  had  a  victim  I  was  pursuing  taken 


THE    SENTIMENT   OP   HEEO- WORSHIP.  459 

refuge  under  his  statue  on  the  Pont  Neuf,  I  would  have 
spared  his  life."  An  apt  illustration,  this,  of  the  coexist 
ence  of  profound  hero-worship  with  the  extremest  savage- 
ness,  and  of  the  means  hero-worship  affords  whereby  the 
savage  may  be  ruled.  The  necessity  for  some  such  senti 
ment  to  bind  men  together  whilst  they  are  as  yet  unsym 
pathetic,  has  been  elsewhere  shown.  For  the  anti-social 
man  to  be  transformed  into  the  social  man,  he  must  live  / 
in  the  social  state.  But  how  can  a  society  be  maintained 
when,  by  the  hypothesis,  the  aggressive  desires  of  its 
members  are  destructive  of  it  ?  Evidently  its  members 
must  possess  some  counterbalancing  tendency  which  shall 
keep  them  in  the  social  state  despite  the  incongruity — 
which  shall  make  them  submit  to  the  restraint  imposed — 
and  which  shall  diminish  as  adaptation  to  the  new  cir 
cumstances  renders  restraint  less  needful.  Such  counter 
balancing  tendency  we  have  in  this  same  sentiment  of 
hero-worship ;  a  sentiment  which  leads  men  to  prostrate 
themselves  before  any  manifestation  of  power,  be  it  in 
chief,  feudal  lord,  king,  or  constitutional  government,  and 
makes  them  act  in  subordination  to  that  power. 

Facts  illustrating  this  alleged  connection  between 
strength  of  hero-worship  and  strength  of  the  aggressive 
propensities,  together  with  other  facts  illustrating  the  si 
multaneous  decline  of  both,  were  given  when  the  matter 
was  first  discussed  (p.  219).  Now,  however,  we  may  ap 
propriately  examine  the  evidence  in  detail.  The  proposi 
tion  is,  that  in  proportion  as  the  members  of  a  community 
are  barbarous,  that  is,  in  proportion  as  they  show  a  lack 
of  moral  sense  by  seeking  gratification  at  each  other's  ex 
pense,  in  the  same  proportion  will  they  show  depth  of 
reverence  for  authority.  What,  now,  are  the  several  indi 
cations  of  deficient  moral  sense  ?  First  on  the  list  stands 
disregard  of  human  life ;  next,  habitual  violation  of  per 
sonal  liberty ;  next  to  that,  theft,  and  the  dishonesty  akin 


460  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

to  it.  Each  of  these,  if  the  foregoing  theory  be  true,  we 
ought  to  find  most  prevalent  where  the  awe  of  power  is 
most  profound. 

Well,  is  it  not  a  fact  that  grovelling  submission  to 
despotic  rule  flourishes  side  by  side  with  the  practice  of 
human  sacrifices,  infanticide,  and  assassination  ?  We  find 
suttees  and  thuggee  amongst  a  race  who  have  ever  been 
abject  slaves.  In  some  of  the  Pacific  isles,  where  the  im 
molation  of  children  to  idols,  and  the  burying  of  parents 
alive,  are  common,  "  so  high  is  the  reverence  for  heredi 
tary  chieftainship  that  it  is  often  connected  with  the  idea 
of  Divine  power."  Complete  absolutism  uniformly  co 
exists  with  cannibalism.  We  read  of  human  hecatombs 
in  connection  with  the  extremest  prostration  of  subjects 
to  rulers.  In  Madagascar,  where  men  are  put  to  death  on 
the  most  trifling  occasions,  and  where  the  coast  is  dec 
orated  with  skulls  stuck  on  poles,  the  people  are  governed 
on  the  severest  maxims  of  feudal  law,  by  absolute  chief 
tains  under  an  absolute  monarch.  The  head-hunting 
Dyaks  of  Borneo  have  petty  tyrants  over  them.  There  is 
autocratic  government,  too,  for  the  bloodthirsty  Mongo 
lian  races.  Both  positive  and  negative  proof  of  this  asso 
ciation  is  given  by  Mr.  Grote,  where  he  says,  "  In  no  city 
of  historical  Gfeece  did  there  prevail  either  human  sacri 
fices  or  deliberate  mutilations,  such  as  cutting  off  the  nose, 
ears,  hands,  feet,  &c.,  or  castration,  or  selling  of  children 
into  slavery,  or  polygamy,  or  the  feeling  of  unlimited  obe 
dience  toward  one  man  ;  all  of  them  customs,  which  might 
be  pointed  out  as  existing  amongst  the  contemporary 
Carthaginians,  Egyptians,  Persians,  Thracians,"  &c.  If 
we  consult  medieval  history,  there,  along  with  loyalty 
strongly  manifested,  are  the  judicial  combats,  right  of  pri 
vate  war,  constant  wearing  of  arms,  religious  martyrdoms 
and  massacres,  <fcc.,  to  prove  that  life  was  held  in  less  re 
spect  than  now.  Glancing  over  modern  Europe,  we  find 


COEEELATED   AMELIORATIONS.  461 

the  assassinations  of  Italy,  the  cruelty  of  the  Croats  and 
Czecks',  and  the  Austrian  butcheries,  illustrating  the  rela 
tionship.  Whilst,  amongst  ourselves,  diminished  rever 
ence  for  authority  has  occurred  simultaneously  with  di 
minished  sanguinariness  in  our  criminal  code. 

That  infringements  of  personal  liberty  are  greatest 
where  awe  of  power  is  greatest,  is  in  some  sort  a  truism, 
seeing  that  forced  servitude,  through  which  alone  exten 
sive  violations  of  human  liberty  can  be  made,  is  impossi 
ble,  unless  the  sentiment  of  power-worship  is  strong. 
Thus,  the  ancient  Persians  could  never  have  allowed  them 
selves  to  be  considered  the  private  property  of  their  mon- 
archs,  had  it  not  been  for  the  overwhelming  influence  of 
this  sentiment.  But  that  such  submission  is  associated 
with  a  defect  of  moral  sense,  is  best  seen  in  the  acknowl 
edged  truth  that  readiness  to  cringe  is  accompanied  by  an 
equal  readiness  to  tyrannize.  Satraps  lorded  it  over  the 
people  as  their  king  over  them.  The  Helots  were  not 
more  coerced  by  their  Spartan  masters  than  these  in  turn 
by  their  oligarchy.  Of  the  servile  Hindoos  we  are  told 
that  "  they  indemnify  themselves  for  their  passiveness  to 
their  superiors  by  their  tyranny,  cruelty,  and  violence  to 
those  in  their  power."  During  the  feudal  ages,  whilst  the 
people  were  bondsmen  to  the  nobles,  the  nobles  were  vas 
sals  to  their  kings,  their  kings  to  the  pope.  In  Russia,  at 
the  present  moment,  the  aristocracy  are  dictated  to  by 
their  emperor  much  as  they  themselves  dictate  to  their 
serfs.  And  when  to  these  facts  we  add  the  significant 
one  elsewhere  dwelt  upon  (pp.  180  and  198),  that  the 
treatment  of  women  by  their  husbands,  and  children  by 
their  parents,  has  been  tyrannical  in  proportion  as  the  ser 
vility  of  subjects  to  rulers  has  been  extreme,  we  have  suffi 
cient  proof  that  hero-worship  is  strongest  where  there  is 
least  regard  for  human  freedom. 

Equally  abundant  evidence  exists  that  the  prevalence 


462  GENEEAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

of  theft  is  similarly  associated  with  a  predominance  of  the 
loyalty-producing  faculty.  Books  of  travels  give  proof 
that  amongst  uncivilized  races  pilfering  and  the  irrespon 
sible  power  of  chiefs  coexist.  The  same  association  of 
dishonesty  and  submissiveness  is  found  amongst  more  ad 
vanced  peoples.  It  is  so  with  the  Hindoos,  with  the  Cing- 
halese,  and  with  the  inhabitants  of  Madagascar.  The  pi 
racy  of  the  Malays,  and  of  the  Chinese,  and  the  long-con 
tinued  predatory  habits  of  the  Arab  races,  both  on  land 
and  sea,  exist  in  conjunction  with  obedience  to  despotic 
rule.  "  One  quality,"  says  Kohl,  "  which  the  Lettes  show, 
with  all  enslaved  tribes,  is  a  great  disposition  to  thieving." 
The  Russians,  to  whom  worship  of  their  emperor  is  a 
needful  luxury,  confess  openly  that  they  are  cheats,  and 
laugh  over  the  confession.  The  Poles,  whose  servile  salu 
tation  is,  "  I  throw  myself  under  your  feet,"  and  amongst 
whom  nobles  are  cringed  to  by  the  Jews  and  citizens,  and 
these  again  by  the  people,  are  certainly  not  noted  for 
probity.  Turning  to  the  superior  races,  we  find  that  they, 
too,  have  passed  through  phases  in  which  this  same  rela 
tionship  of  characteristics  was  strongly  marked.  Thus, 
the  times  when  fealty  of  serfs  to  feudal  barons  was  strong 
est,  were  times  of  universal  rapine.  "  In  Germany  a  very 
large  proportion  of  the  rural  nobility  lived  by  robbery ; " 
their  castles  being  built  with  a  special  view  to  this  occu 
pation,  and  that  even  by  ecclesiastics.*  Burghers  were 
fleeced,  towns  were  now  and  then  sacked,  and  Jews  were 
tortured  for  their  money.  Kings  were  as  much  thieves  as 
the  rest.  They  laid  violent  hands  upon  the  goods  of  their 
vassals,  like  John  of  England  and  Philip  Augustus  of 

*  "  An  Archbishop  of  Cologne  having  built  a  fortress  of  this  kind,  the 
governor  inquired  how  he  was  to  maintain  himself,  no  revenue  having  been 
assigned  for  that  purpose.  The  prelate  only  desired  him  to  remark,  that 
the  castle  was  situated  near  the  junction  of  four  cross  roads." — Hallani's 
Middle  Ages. 


TRAITS   ACCOMPANYING   LOYALTY.  463 

France ;  they  cheated  their  creditors  by  debasing  the 
coinage ;  they  impressed  men's  horses  without  paying 
for  them;  and  they  seized  the  goods  of  traders,  sold 
them,  and  pocketed  a  large  part  of  the  proceeds.  Mean 
time,  whilst  freebooters  overran  the  land,  pirates  cov 
ered  the  sea,  the  Cinque  Ports  and  St.  Maloe's  being 
the  head  quarters  of  those  infesting  the  English  Chan 
nel. 

TRptwppTi  thpsp.  days  and  ours,  the  gradual  decline  of 
loyalty — as  shown  in  the  extinction  of  feudal  relation 
ships,  in  the  abandonment  of  divine  right  of  kings,  in  the 
reduction  of  monarchical  power,  and  in  the  comparative 
leniency  with  which  treason  is  now  punished — has  accom 
panied  an  equally  gradual  increase  of  honesty,  and  of  re 
gard  for  people's  lives  and  liberties.  By  how  much  men 
are  still  deficient  in  respect  for  each  other's  rights,  by  so 
much  are  they  still  penetrated  with  respect  for  authority ; 
and  we  may  even  trace  in  existing  parties  the  constant 
ratio  preserved  between  these  characteristics.  It  has 
been  shown,  for  instance,  that  the  unskilled  labourers  of 
the  metropolis,  wTho,  instead  of  entertaining  violently 
democratic  opinions,  appear  to  have  no  political  opinions 
k  whatever,  or,  if  they  think  at  all,  rather  lean  toward  the. 
maintenance  of  "  things  as  they  are,"  and  part  of  whom, 
(the  coalwhippers)  are  extremely  proud  of  their  having 
turned  out  to  a  man  on  the  10th  of  April,  1848,  and  be 
come  special  constables  for  the  "  maintenance  of  law  and 
order  "  on  the  day  of  the  great  Chartist  Demonstration — 
it  has  been  shown  that  these  same  unskilled  labourers 
constitute  the  most  immoral  class.  The  Criminal-Returns 
prove  them  to  be  nine  times  as  dishonest,  five  times  as 
drunken,  and  nine  times  as  savage  (shown  by  the  assaults), 
as  the  rest  of  the  community.  Of  like  import  is  the  ob 
servation  respecting  convicts,  quoted  and  confirmed  by 
Captain  Maconochie,  that  "  a  good  prisoner  (i.  e.  a  sub- 


464:  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

missive  one)  is  usually  a  bad  man."  *  If,  again,  we  turn 
over  the  newspapers  which  circulate  amongst  court 
satellites,  and  chronicle  the  movements  of  the  haut-ton, 
which  ascribe  national  calamities  to  the  omission  of  a 
royal  title  from  a  new  coin,  and  which  apologize  for  con 
tinental  despots ;  we  read  in  them  excuses  for  war  and 
standing  armies,  sneerings  at  "  peace-mongers,"  defences 
of  capital  punishment,  condemnations  of  popular  enfran 
chisement,  diatribes  against  freedom  of  exchange,  rejoic 
ings  over  territorial  robberies,  and  vindications  of  church- 
rate  seizures :  showing  that,  where  belief  in  the  sacred- 
ness  of  authority  most  lingers,  belief  in  the  sacredness  of 
life,  of  liberty,  and  of  property,  is  least  displayed. 

— '—•H*- 

§  7.  ^The  fact  that,  during^civilization,  hero-worship 
and  moral  sense  vary  inversely,^  simply  the  obverse  of 
the  fact  already  hinted,  that  society  is  possible  so  long 
only  as  they  continue  to  do  this.  ..Where  there  is  insuffi 
cient  reverence  for  the  Divine  Law,  there  must  be  supple 
mentary  reverence  for  human  law;  -..otherwise  there  will 
be  complete  lawlessness  or  barbarism^  Evidently  Jfjncn 
are  to  live  together,  the  absence  of  internal  power  to  rule" 
themselves  rightly  toward  each  other,  necessitates  the 
presence  of  external  power  to  enforce  such  behaviour  as 
may  make  association  tolerable;  and  this  power  can 
become  operative  only  by  being  held  in  awe.  So  that 
wild  races  deficient  in  the  allegiance-producing  senti 
ment  cannot  enter  into  a  civilized  state  at  all ;  but  have 
to  be  supplanted  by  others  that  can.  And  it  must 
further  follow,  that  if  in  any  community  loyalty  dimin 
ishes  at  a  greater  rate  than  equity  increases,  there 
will  arise  a  tendency  toward  social  dissolution — a  ten 
dency  which  the  populace  of  Paris  threaten  to  illus 
trate. 

*  See  pamphlets  on  the  Mark  System  of  Discipline. 


SELFISHNESS   AND   POWEK-WOESHIP.  465 

How  needful  the  continuance  of  a  savage  selfishness 
renders  the  continuance  of  a  proportionate  amount  of  pow 
er-worship,  may  be  perceived  daily.  Listen  to  the  chat- 
tings  of  men  about  their  affairs ;  examine  into  trade  prac 
tices  ;  read  over  business  correspondence ;  or  get  a  solici 
tor  to  detail  his  conversations  with  clients : — you  will  find 
that  in  most  cases  conduct  depends,  not  upon  what  is 
right,  but  upon  what  is  legal.  Provided  they  "  keep  o' 
the  windy  side  of  the  law,"  the  great  majority  are  but 
little  restrained  by  regard  for  strict  rectitude.  The  ques 
tion  with  your  every-day  man  of  the  world  is,  not — May 
the  claimant  justly  require  thus  much  of  me  ?  but  rather 
— "  Is  it  so  nominated  in  the  bond  ?  "  If  "  an  action  will 
lie,""  such  an  one  will  commonly  enough  take  proceedings 
to  obtain  what  he  knows  himself  not  equitably  entitled  to; 
and  if  "  the  law  allows  it  and  the  court  awards  it,"  will 
pocket  all  he  can  get  without  scruple.  When  we  find 
doings  like  these  regarded  as  matters  of  course,  and  those 
guilty  of  them  passing  for  respectable  men — when  we 
thus  find  that  so  many  will  deal  fairly  by  their  fellows 
'only  on  compulsion — we  discover  how  requisite  is  the 
sentiment  from  which  the  compelling  instrumentality  de 
rives  its  power. 

Without  doubt  this  sentiment  has  begotten  many 
gigantic  evils,  some  of  which  it  still  nurtures.  The  vari 
ous  superstitions  that  have  prevailed,  and  that  still  pre 
vail,  as  to  the  great  things  legislature  can  do,  and  the 
disastrous  meddlings  growing  out  of  these  superstitions, 
are  due  to  it.  The  veneration  which  produces  submission 
to  a  government,  unavoidably  invests  that  government 
with  proportionately  high  attributes;  for  being  in  essence 
a  worship  of  power,  it  can  be  strongly  drawn  out  toward 
that  only  which  either  has  great  power,  or  is  believed  to 
have  it.  Hence,  the  old  delusions  that  rulers  can  fix  the 
value  of  money,  the  rate  of  wages,  and  the  price  of  food. 
20* 


466  GENEKAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

Hence,  the  still  current  fallacies  about  mitigating  distress, 
easing  monetary  pressures,  and  curing  over-population  by 
law.  Hence,  also,  the  monstrous,  though  generally- 
received  doctrine,  that  a  legislature  may  equitably  take 
people's  property  to  such  extent,  and  for  such  purposes, 
as  it  thinks  fit — for  maintaining  state-churches,  feeding 
paupers,  paying  schoolmasters,  founding  colonies,  &c. 
And  hence,  lastly,  the  astounding  belief  that  an  act  of 
parliament  can  abrogate  one  of  Nature's  decrees — can, 
for  instance,  render  it  criminal  in  a  trader  to  buy  goods 
in  France,  and  bring  them  here  to  sell,  whilst  the  moral 
law  says  it  is  criminal  to  prevent  him !  As  though  con 
duct  could  be  made  right  or  wrong  by  the  votes  of  some 
men  sitting  in  a  room  in  Westminster!  Yet,  in  spite 'of 
all  this — in  spite  of  the  false  theories  and  mischievous  in 
terferences,  the  numberless  oppressions,  disasters,  and 
miseries,  in  one  way  or  other  traceable  to  it,  we  must  ad 
mit  that  this  power-worship  has  fulfilled,  and  does  still 
fulfil,  a  very  important  function,  and  that  it  may  advan 
tageously  last  as  long  as  it  can. 

,* 

§  8.  That  it  cannot  last  longer  than  needful  may  be 
readily  proved.  In  a  way  equally  simple  and  perfect  it  is 
made  to  decline  as  fast  as  it  can  be  done  without.  The 
very  feeling,  during  whose  minority  it  exercises  regency 
over  men,  becomes  the  destroyer  of  its  power.  Between 
the  temporary  ruler  and  the  ultimate  rightful  one, 
there  is  an  unceasing  conflict,  in  which  the  wane  of  in 
fluence  on  the  one  side  is  necessitated  by  its  growth  on 
the  other. 

For,  as  already  shown  (p.  115),  the  sense  of  rights,  by 
whose  sympathetic  excitement  men  are  led  to  behave 
justly  toward  each  other,  is  the  same  sense  of  rights  by 
which  they  are  prompted  to  assert  their  own  claims — their 
own  liberty  of  action — their  own  freedom  to  exercise  their 


4UJL    flu, 
GEOWTH    OF   MOEAL   SENSE.  467 

faculties,  and  to  resist  every  encroachment.  This  impulse 
brooks  no  restraint,  save  that  imposed  by  fellow  feeling ; 
and  disputes  all  assumption  of  extra  privilege  by  whomso 
ever  made.  Consequently,  it  is  in  perpetual  antagonism 
with  a  sentiment  wThich  delights  in  subserviency.  "  Rev 
erence  this  authority,"  suggests  power-worship.  "  Why 
should  I  ?  who  set  it  over  me  ?  "  demands  instinct  of  free 
dom.  "  Obey,"  whispers  the  one.  "  Rebel,"  mutters  the 
other.  "  I  will  do  what  your  Highness  bids,"  says  the 
one  with  bated  breath.  "Pray,  sir,"  shouts  the  other, 
"  who  are  you,  that  you  should  dictate  to  me  ?  "  "  This 
man  is  Divinely  appointed  to  rule  over  us,  and  we  ought 
therefore  to  submit,"  argues  the  one.  "  I  tell  you,  no," 
replies  the  other ;  "  we  have  Divinely-endorsed  claims  to 
freedom,  and  it  is  our  duty  to  maintain  them."  And  thus 
the  controversy  goes  on :  conduct  during  each  phase  of 
civilization  being  determined  by  the  relative  strengths  of 
the  two  feelings.  Whilst  yet  too  feeble  to  be  operative 
as  a  social  restraint,  moral  sense,  by  its  scarcely-heard 
protest,  does  not  hinder  a  predominant  hero-worship  from 
giving  possibility  to  the  most  stringent  despotism.  Grad 
ually,  as  it  grows  strong  enough  to  deter  men  from  the 
grosser  trespasses  upon  each  other,  does  it  also  grow 
strong  enough  to  struggle  successfully  against  that  excess 
of  coercion  no  longer  required.  And  when  it  shall  finally 
have  attained  sufficient  power  to  give  men,  by  its  reflex 
function,  so  perfect  a  regard  for  each  other's  rights  as  to 
make  government  needless ;  then  will  it  also,  by  its  direct 
function,  give  men  so  wakeful  a  jealousy  of  their  own 
rights  as  to  make  government  impossible.  A  further 
example,  this,  of  the  admirable  simplicity  of  nature. 
The  same  sentiment  which  fits  us  for  freedom,  itself  makes 
us  free. 

Of  course  the  institutions  of  any  given  age  exhibit  the 
compromise  made  by  these  contending  moral  forces  at  the 


468  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

signing  of  their  last  truce.  Beiwe-ejouthastate  of -unlimited, 
government  arising  from  supremacy  of  the  one  feeling, 
and  the  state  of  no  government  arising  from  supremacy 
of  the  other,  lie  intermediate  forms  of  social  organization, 
beginning  with  "  despotism  tempered  by  assassination," 
and  ending  with  that  highest  development  of  the  represent 
ative  system,  under  which  the  right  of  constituents  to 
instruct  their  delegates  is  fully  admitted — a  system  which, 
by  making  the  nation  at  large  a  deliberative  body,  and 
reducing  the  legislative  assembly  to  an  executive,  carries 
self-government  to  the  fullest  extent  compatible  with  the 
existence  of  a  ruling  power.  Of  necessity  the  mixed  con 
stitutions  that  characterize  this  transition  period,  are  in 
the  abstract  absurd.  The  two  feelings  answering  to  the 
popular  and  monarchical  elements,  being  antagonistic, 
give  utterance  to  antagonistic  ideas.  And  to  suppose 
that  these  can  be  consistently  united,  is  to  suppose  that 
yes  and  no  can  be  reconciled.  The  monarchical  theory  is, 
that  the  people  are  in  duty  bound  to  submit  themselves 
with  all  humility  to  a  certain  individual — ought  to  be 
loyal  to  him — ought  to  give  allegiance  to  him,  that  is — 
ought  to  subordinate  their  wills  to  his  will.  Contrari 
wise  the  democratic  theory — either  as  specifically  defined, 
or  as  embodied  in  our  own  constitution  under  the  form  of 
a  power  to  withhold  supplies  and  in  the  legal  fiction  that 
the  citizen  assents  to  the  laws  he  has  to  obey — is,  that  the 
people  ought  not  to  be  subject  to  the  will  of  one,  but 
should  fulfil  their  own  wills.  Now  these  are  flat  contra 
dictions,  which  no  reasoning  can  harmonize.  If  a  king 
may  rightfully  claim  obedience,  then  should  that  obedi 
ence  be  entire ;  else  there  starts  up  the  unanswerable 
question — why  must  we  obeyi  in  this  and  not  in  that  ? 
But  if  men  should  mainly  rule  themselves,  then  should 
they  rule  themselves  altogether.  Otherwise  it  may  be 
asked — why  are  they  their  own  masters  in  such  and  such 
cases,  and  not  in  the  rest  ? 

>•  i\C>%  . 


INSTITUTIONS    CORRESPOND   TO   MEN'S   NATURES.       469 

(  Nevertheless,  though  these  mixed  governments,  com 
bining  as  they  do  two  mutually-destructive  hypotheses, 
are  utterly  irrational  in  principle,  they  must  of  necessity 
exist,  so  long  as  they  are  in  harmony  with  the  mixed  con 
stitution  of  the  partially-adapted  man.  And  it  seems  that 
the  radical  incongruity  pervading  them  cannot  be  recog 
nized  by  men,  whilst  there  exists  a  corresponding  incon 
gruity  in  their  own  natures :  a  good  illustration  of  the  law 
that  opinion  is  ultimately  determined  by  the  feelings,  and 
not  by  the  intellect. 

§  9.  How  completely,  indeed /conceptions  of  right 
and  wrong  in  these  matters  depencbupon  the  balance  of 
impulses  /existing  in  men,^may  be  worth  considering  a 
moment.  And  first,  observe  that  no  tracing  out  of  actions 
to  their  final  good  or  bad  consequences,  is,  by  itself,  capa 
ble  of  generating  approbation,  or  reprobation,  of  those 
actions.  Could  it  do  this,  men's  moral  codes  would  be 
high  or  low,  according  as  they  made  these  analyses  well 
or  ill,  that  is — according  to  their  intellectual  acuteness. 
Whence  it  would  follow,  that  in  all  ages  and  nations, 
men  of  equal  intelligence  should  have  like  ethical  theories, 
whilst  contemporaries  should  have  unlike  ones,  if  their 
reflective  powers  are  unlike.  But  facts  do  not  answer  to 
these  inferences.  On  the  contrary,  they  point  to  the  law 
above  specified.  Both  history  and  daily  experience  prove 
to  us  that{  men's  ideas  of  rectitude  correspond  to  the  senti 
ments  and  instincts  predominating  in  them)  (pp.  37,  177, 
382).  We  constantly  read  of  tyrants  defending  their 
claims  to  unlimited  sway  as  being  Divinely  authorized. 
The  rights  of  rival  princes  were  of  old  asserted  by  their 
respective  partisans,  and  are  still  asserted  by  modern 
legitimists,  with  the  same  warmth  that  the  most  ardent 
democrat  asserts  the  rights  of  man.  To  those  living  in  the 
feudal  times,  so  unquestionable  seemed  the  duty  of  serfs  to 


470  GENERAL    CONSIDEEATIONS. 

obey  their  lords,  that  Luther  (no  doubt  acting  conscien 
tiously)  urged  the  barons  to  vengeance  on  the  rebellious 
peasants,  calling  on  all  who  could  "  to  stab  them,  cut 
them  down,  and  dash  their  brains  out,  as  if  they  were 
mad  dogs."  Moreover,  we  shall  find,  that  absence  of  the 
ethical  sentiment  completely  disables  the  mind  from 
realizing  the  abstract  title  of  the  human  being  to  freedom. 
Thus,  with  all  his  high  reasoning  powers,  Plato  could  con 
ceive  of  nothing  better  for  his  ideal  republic  than  a  sys 
tem  of  class  despotism ;  and,  indeed,  up  to  his  time,  and 
long  after  it,  there  seems  to  have  existed  no  man  who  saw 
any  thing  wrong  in  slavery.  It  is  narrated  of  Colonel 
D'Oyley,  the  first  governor  of  Jamaica,  that  within  a  few 
days  after  having  issued  an  order  "  for  the  distribution  to 
the  army  of  1701  Bibles,"  he  signed  another  order  for  the 
"  payment  of  the  summe  of  twenty  pounds  sterling,  out 
of  the  impost  money,  to  pay  for  fifteen  doggs,  brought  by 
John  Hoy,  for  the  hunting  of  the  negroes."  The  holding 
of  slaves  by  ministers  of  religion  in  America  is  a  parallel 
fact.  We  read  that  the  Chinese  cannot  understand  why 
European  women  are  treated  with  respect ;  and  that  they 
attribute  the  circumstance  to  the  exercise  of  demoniacal 
arts  by  them  over  the  men.  Here  and  there  amongst  our 
selves,  analogous  phenomena  may  be  detected.  For  ex 
ample,  Dr.  Mobeiiy,  of  Winchester  College,  has  written  a 
book  to  defend  fagging,  which  he  says,  as  a  system  of 
school-government,  gives  "  more  security  of  essential  deep- 
seated  goodness  than  any  other  which  can  be  devised." 
Again,  in  a  recent  pamphlet,  signed  "  A  Country  Parson," 
it  is  maintained,  that  "  you  must  convert  the  Chartist 
spirit  as  you  would  reform  the  drunkard's  spirit,  by  show 
ing  that  it  is  a  rebellion  against  the  laws  of  God."  But 
the  strangest  peculiarity  exhibited  by  those  deficient  in 
sense  of  rights — or  rather  that  which  looks  the  strangest 
to  us — is  their  inability  to  recognize  their  own  claims. 


DEFICIENT   SENSE   OF   EIGHTS.  471 

We  are  told,  for  instance,  by  Lieutenant  Bernard,*  that 
in  the  Portuguese  settlements  on  the  African  coast,  the 
free  negroes  are  "taunted  by  the  slaves  as  having  no 
white  man  to  look  after  them,  and  see  them  righted  when 
oppressed;"  and  it  is  said  that  in  America  the  slaves 
themselves  look  down  upon  the  free  blacks,  and  call  them 
rubbish^  Which  anomalous-looking  facts  are,  however, 
easily  conceivable  when  we  remember  that  here  in  Eng 
land,  in  this  nineteenth  century,  most  women  defend  that 
state  of  servitude  in  which  they  are  held  by  men. 

To  account,  by  any  current  hypothesis,  for  the  number 
less  disagreements  in  men's  ideas  of  right  and  wrong  here 
briefly  exemplified,  seems  scarcely  possible.  But  on  the 
theory  that/opinion  is  a  resultant  of  moral  forces,  whose 
equilibrium  varies  with  every  race  and  epoch — that  is, 
with  every  phase  of  adaptation — the  rationale  is  self-evi 
dent.  Nor,  indeed,  considering  the  matter  closely,  does 
it  appear  that  society  could  ever  hold  together  were  not 
opinion  thus  dependent  upon  the  balance  of  feelings.  For 
were  it  otherwise,  races  yet  needing  coercive  government 
might  reason  their  way  to  the  conclusion  that  coercive 
government  was  bad,  as  readily  as  more  advanced  races. 
The  Russians  might  sec  despotism  to  be  wrong,  and  free 
institutions  to  be  right,  as  clearly  as  we  do.  And  did 
they  see  this,  social  dissolution  would  ensue ;  for  it  is  not 
conceivable  that  they  would  any  longer  remain  contented 
under  that  stringent  rule  needed  to  keep  them  in  the 
social  state.  \ 

§  10.  /The  process  by  which  a  change  of  political 
arrangements  is  effected,  when  the  incongruity  between 
them  and  the  popular  character  becomes  sufficient,  must  be 
itself  in  keeping  with  that  character,  and  must  be  violent 
or  peaceful  accordingly.  There  are  not  a  few  who  exclaim 

*  "  TJtrce  Years'  Ct'uisc  in  the  Mozambique  Channel" 


472  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

against  all  revolutions  wrought  out  by  force  of  arms,  for 
getting  that  the  quality  of  a  revolution,  like  that  of  an 
institution,  is  determined  by  the  natures  of  those  who 
make  it.  Moral  suasion  is  very  admirable;  good  for  us; 
good,  indeed,  for  all  who  can  be  induced  to  use  it.  But  to 
suppose  that,  in  the  earlier  stages  of  social  growth,  moral 
suasion  can  be  employed,  or,  if  employed,  would  answer,  is 
to  overlook  the  conditions.  Stating  the  case  mechanically, 
we  may  say  that(^as,  in  proportion  to  their  unfitness  for 
associated  life,  the  framework  within  which  men  are  re 
strained  must  be  strong,  so  must  the  efforts  required  to 
break  up  that  framework,  when  it  is  no  longer  fit,  be  con 
vulsive.  JThe  existence  of  a  government  which  does  not 
bend  to  the  popular  will — a  despotic  government — pre 
supposes  several  circumstances  which  make  any  change 
but  a  violent  one  impossible.  First,  for  coercive  rule  to 
have  been  practicable,  implies  in  the  people  a  predominance 
of  that  awe  of  power  ever  indicative  of  still  lingering  sav- 
ageness.  Moreover,  with  a  large  amount  of  power- worship 
present,  disaffection  can  take  place  only  when  the  cumula 
tive  evils  of  misgovernment  have  generated  great  exaspera 
tion.  Add  to  which,  that  as  abundance  of  the  sentiment 
upholding  external  rule,  involves  lack  of  the  sentiments 
producing  internal  rule,  no  such  check  to  excesses  as  that 
afforded  by  a  due  regard  for  the  lives  and  claims  of  others, 
can  be  operative.  And  where  there  are  comparatively 
active  destructive  propensities,  extreme  anger,  and  defi 
cient  sell-restraint,  violence  is  inevitable.  Peaceful  revo 
lutions  occur  under  quite  different  circumstances.  They 
become  possible  only  when  society,  no  longer  consisting 
of  members  so  antagonistic,  begins  to  cohere  from  its  own 
internal  organization,  and  needs  not  be  kept  together  by 
unyielding  external  restraints ;  and  when,  by  consequence, 
the  force  required  to  effect  change  is  less.  They  become 
possible  only  when  men,  having  Acquired  greater  adapta- 


PHENOMENA   OF    SOCIAL    CONVULSIONS.  473 

tio;i  to  the  social  state,  will  neither  inflict  on  each  other, 
nor  submit  to,  such  extreme  oppressions,  and  when,  there 
fore,  the  causes  of  popular  indignation  are  diminished. 
They  become  possible  only  when  character  has  grown 
more  sympathetic,  and  when,  as  a  result  of  this,  the  ten 
dency  toward  angry  retaliation  is  partially  neutralized. 
Indeed,  the  very  idea  that  reforms  may  and  ought  to 
be  effected  peacefully  implies  a  large  endowment  of  the 
moral  sense.  Without  this,  such  an  idea  cannot  even  be 
conceived,  much  less  carried  out ;  with  this,  it  may  be 
both. 

Hence,  (we  must  look  upon  social  convulsions  as  upon 
other  natural  phenomena,  which  woi4^  themselves  out  in  a 
certain  inevitable,  unalterable  way.  /We  may  lament  the 
bloodshed — may  wish  it  had  been  avoided ;  but  it  is  folly 
to  suppose  that,  the  popular  character  remaining  the  same, 
things  could  have  been  managed  differently.  If  such  and 
such  events  had  not  occurred,  say  you,  the  result  would 
have  been  otherwise ;  if  this  or  that  man  had  lived,  he 
would  have  -prevented  the  catastrophe.  Do  not  be  thus 
deceived.  /  These  changes  are  brought  about  by  a  power 
far  above  "individual  wills.  ••  Men  who  seem  the  prime 
movers,  are  merely  the  tools  with  which  it  works,;  and 
were  they  absent,  it  would  quickly  find  others.  C  Incon 
gruity  between  character  and  institutions  is  the  disturbing 
force,  and  a  revolution  is  the  act  of  restoring  equilibrium. 
Accidental  circumstances  modify  the  process,  but  do  not 
perceptibly  alter  the  effect.  They  precipitate ;  they  re 
tard  ;  they  intensify  or  ameliorate ;  but,  let  a  few  years 
elapse,  and  the  same  end  is  arrived  at,  no  matter  what  the 
special  events  passed  through.  J 

That  these  violent  overturnings  of  early  institutions 
fail  to  do  what  their  originators  hope,  and  that  they  finally 
result  in  the  setting,  up  of  institutions  not  much  better 
than  those  superseded,  is  very  true  (p.  270).  But  it  is  not 


GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

the  less  true  that  the  modifications  they  effect  can  be 
effected  in  no  other  way.  Non-adaptation  necessitates  a 
bad  mode  of  making  changes,  as  well  as  a  bad  political 
organization.  Not  only  must  the  habitual  rule  it  calls  for 
be  severe,  but  even  small  ameliorations  of  this  cannot  be 
obtained  without  much  suffering.  Conversely,  the  same 
causes  which  render  a  better  social  state  possible,  render 
the  successive  modifications  of  it  easier.  These  occur 
under  less  pressure ;  with  smaller  disturbance ;  and  more 
frequently :  until,  by  a  gradual  diminution  in  the  amounts 
and  intervals  of  change,  the  process  merges  into  one  of 
uninterrupted  growth. 

§  11.  \There  is  another  form  under  which  civiliza 
tion  oan  be  generalized.  We  may  consider  it  as  a  pro 
gress  toward  that  constitution  of  man  and  society 
required  for  the  complete  manifestation  of  every  one's 
individuality.  To  be  that  which  he  naturally  is — to  do 
just  what  he  would  spontaneously  do — is  essential  to  the 
full  happiness  of  each,  and  therefore  to  the  greatest  happi 
ness  of  all.  Hence,  in  virtue  of  the  law  of  adaptation,  our 
advance  must  be  toward  a  state  in  which  this  entire  satis 
faction  of  every  desire,  or  perfect  fulfilment  of  individual 
life,  becomes  possible.  In  the  beginning  it  is  impossible. 
If  uncontrolled,  the  impulses  of  the  aboriginal  man  pro 
duce  anarchy.  Either  his  individuality  must  be  curbed, 
or  society  must  dissolve.  With  ourselves,  though 
restraint  is  still  needful,  the  private  will  of  the  citi 
zen,  not  being  so  destructive  of  order,  has  more  play. 
And  further  progress  must  be  toward  increased  sacred- 
ness  of  personal  claims,  and  a  subordination  of  whatever 
limits  them. 

There  are  plenty  of  facts  illustrating  the  doctrine  that 
under  primitive  governments  the  repression  of  individ 
uality  is  greatest,  and  that  it  becomes  less  as  we  ad- 


, 

PEOGKESS    OF    INDIVIDUALITY.  4:75 

vancc.  Referring  to  the  people  of  Egypt,  Assyria,  China, 
and  Hindostan,  as  contrasted  with  those  of  Greece,  Mr. 
Grote  says,  "  The  religious  and  political  sanction,  some 
times  combined  and  sometimes  separate,  determined  for 
every  one  his  mode  of  life,  his  creed,  his  duties,  and  his 
place  in  society,  without  leaving  any  scope  for  the  will  or 
reason  of  the  individual  himself."  The  ownership  of  peo 
ple  by  rulers,  from  its  pure  form  under  Darius,  through 
its  various  modifications  down  to  the  time  of  u  Uetat  c'est 
moi"  and  as  even  still  typified  amongst  ourselves  in  the 
expression,  "  my  subjects,"  must  be  considered  as  a  greater 
or  less  merging  of  many  individualities  into  one.  The 
parallel  relationships  of  slaves  or  serfs  to  their  master,  and 
of  the  family  to  its  head,  have  implied  the  same  thing.  In 
short,  all  despotisms,  whether  political  or  religious,  whether 
of  sex,  of  caste,  or  of  custom,  may  be  generalized  as  limita 
tions  of  individuality,  which  it  is  in  the  nature  of  civili 
zation  to  remove. 

"Of  course,  in  advancing  from  the  one  extreme,  in  which  ; 
the  state  is  every  thing  and  the  individual  nothing,  to  the 
other  extreme,  in  which  the  individual  is  every  thing  arid 
the  state  nothing,  society  must  pass  through  many  inter 
mediate  phases,  "j  Aristocracy  and  democracy  are  not,  as 
they  have  been -called,  separate  and  conflicting  principles; 
but  they  and  their  various  mixtures  with  each  other  and 
with  monarchy  mark  the  stages  in  this  progress  toward 
complete  individuality.  Nor  is  it  only  by  amelioration 
of  governmental  forms  that  the  growth  of  private  claims 
as  opposed  to  public  ones  is  shown.  It  is  shown,  too,  by 
the  alteration  in  voluntary  unions — in  political  parties,  for 
instance ;  the  manifest  tendency  of  which  is  toward  disso 
lution,  by  internal  divisions,  by  diminution  of  power  over 
their  members,  by  increasing  heterogeneity  of  opinion  ; 
that  is — by  the  spread  of  a  personal  independence  fatal  to 
them.  Still  better  do  the  changes  in  religious  organiza- 


476  GENEKAL    CONSIDEKATIONS. 

tions  illustrate  this  law.  That  multiplication  of  sects 
which  has  been  going  on  in  these  latter  times  with  increas 
ing  rapidity,  and  which  is  now  so  abundantly  exemplified 
by  the  severing  of  the  Establishment  into  Evangelical, 
High  Church,  and  Puseyite  ;  again,  by  the  Free  Church 
secession  ;  again,  by  the  schism  of  the  Methodists  ;  again, 
by  Unitarian  differences;  again,  by  the  splitting-off  of 
numberless  local  congregations  not  to  be  classed;  and, 
again,  by  the  preaching  that  identity  of  opinion  should 
not  be  the  bond  of  union  —  the  universal  tendency  to  sep 
arate  thus  exhibited,  is  simply  one  of  the  ways  in  which 
a  growing  assertion  of  individuality  comes  out.  Ulti 
mately,  by  continual  subdivision,  what  we  call  sects  will 
disappear  ;  and  in  place  of  that  artificial  uniformity,  ob 
tained  by  stamping  men  after  an  authorized  pattern,  there 
will  arise  one  of  nature's  uniformities  —  a  general  similar 
ity,  with  infinitesimal  differences. 


§  12.  (  From  the  point  of  view  now  arrived  at,  we 
may  discern  how  what  is  termed  in  our  artificial  classifica' 
tions  of  truth,  morality,  is  essentially  one  with  physical/ 
truth  —  is,  in  fact,  a  species  of  transcendental  physiology. 
That  condition  of  things  dictated  by  the  law  of  equal 
freedom  —  that  condition  in  which  the  individuality  of  each 
may  be  unfolded  without  limit,  save  the  like  individuali 
ties  of  others  —  that  condition  toward  which,  as  we  have 
just  seen,  mankind  are  progressing,  is  a  condition  toward 
which  the  whole  creation  tends.  Already  it  has  been  in 
cidentally  pointed  out  that  only  by  entire  fulfilment  of 
the  moral  law  can  life  become  complete  (p.  195)  ;  and  now 
we  shall  find  that  all  life  whatever  may  be  defined  as  a 
quality,  of  whj.ch  aptitude  to  fulfil  this  law'  is  the  highest 
manifestation,  j 

A  theory  o'f  life  developed  by  Coleridge  has  prepared 
the  way  for  this  generalization.     f^By  life,"  says  he,  "I 

.'        ^ 


THE   SIMPLER   FORMS   OF   LIFE. 

everywhere  mean  the  true  idea  of  life,  or  that  most  gen 
eral  form  under  which  life  manifests  itself  to  us,  which  in 
cludes  all  other  forms.  This  I  have  stated  to  be  the  ten 
dency  to  indimduation  /  and  the  degrees  or  intensities  of 
life  to  consist  in  the  progressive  realizations  of  this  ten 
dency.'^  To  make  this  definition  intelligible,  a  few  of  the 
facts  sought  to  be  expressed  by  it  must  be  specified — facts 
exemplifying  the  contrast  between  low  and  high  types  of 
structure,  and  low  and  high  degrees  of  vitality. 

Restricting  our  illustrations  to  the  animal  kingdom, 
and  beginning  where  the  vital  attributes  are  most  obscure, 
we  find,  for  instance,  in  the  genus  Porifera,  creatures  con 
sisting  of  nothing  but  amorphous  semi-fluid  jelly,  sup 
ported  upon  horny  fibres  (sponge).  This  jelly  possesses 
no  sensitiveness,  has  no  organs,  absorbs  nutriment  from 
the  water  which  permeates  its  mass,  and,  if  cut  in  pieces, 
lives  on,  in  each  part,  as  before.  So  that  this  "  gelatinous 
film,"  as  it  has  been  called,  shows  little  more  individuality 
thanjL  formless  lump  of  inanimate  matter,  for,  like  that,  it 
possesses  no  distinction  of  parts,  and,  like  that  also,  has 
no  greater  completeness  than  the  pieces  it  is  divided  into. 
Inlhe  compound  polyps  which  stand  next,  and  with  which 
Coleridge  commences,  the  progress  toward  individuality 
is  manifest ;  for  there  is  now  distinction  of  parts.  To  the 
originally  uniform  gelatinous'  mass  with  canals  running 
through  it,  we  have  superadded,  in  the  Alcyonidcz,  a  num 
ber  of  digestive  sacks,  with  accompanying  mouths  and 
tentacles.  Here  is,  evidently,  a  partial  segregation  into 
individualities — a  progress  toward  separateness.  There  is 
still  complete  community  of  nutrition ;  whilst  each  polyp 
has  a  certain  independent  sensitiveness  and  contractility. 
From  this  stage  onwards,  there  appear  to  be  several 
routes ;  one  through  the  Corallidce,  in  which  the  polyp-bear 
ing  mass  surrounds  a  calcarous  axis,  up  to  the  Tiibiporidce, 
in  which  the  polys,  no  longer  united,  inhabit  separate  cells, 


478  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

seated  in  a  common  calcareous  framework.  But  Coleridge 
has  overlooked  the  remarkable  mode  in  which  these  com 
munist  polyps  are  linked  with  higher  individual  organ 
isms  by  the  transitional  arrangement  seen  in  the  common 
Ilydrce,  or  fresh-water  polyps  of  our  ponds.  These  crea 
tures  (which  are  in  structure  similar  to  the  separate  mem 
bers  of  the  compound  animal  above  described),  multiply 
by  gemmation,  that  is,  by  the  budding  out  of  young  ones 
from  the  body  of  the  parent.  "  During  the  first  period  of 
the  formation  of  these  sprouts,  they  are  evidently  contin 
uous  with  the  general  substance  from  which  they  arise ; 
and  even  when  considerably  perfected,  and  possessed  of 
an  internal  cavity  and  tentacula,  their  stomachs  freely 

communicate  with  that  of  their  parent As  soon 

as  the  newly-formed  hydra  is  capable  of  catching  prey,  it 
begins  to  contribute  to  the  support  of  its  parent ;  the  food 
which  it  captures  passing  through  the  aperture  at  its  base 
into  the  body  of  the  original  polyp.  At  length,  when  the 
young  is  fully  formed,  and  ripe  for  independent  existence, 
the  point  of  union  between  the  two  becomes  more  and 
more  slender,  until  a  slight  effort  on  the  part  of  either  is 
sufficient  to  detach  them,  and  the  process  is  completed.  .  . . 
Sometimes  six  or  seven  gemmae  have  been  observed  to 
sprout  at  once  from  the  same  hydra ;  and  although  the 
whole  process  is  concluded  in  twenty-four  hours,  not  un- 
frequently  a  third  generation  may  be  observed  springing 
from  the  newly-formed  polyps  even  before  their  separation 
from  their  parent ;  eighteen  have  in  this  manner  been  seen 
united  into  one  group."  *  Now  here  is  a  creature  which 
cannot  be  strictly  called  either  simple  or  compound. 
Nominally,  it  is  an  individual ;  practically,  it  never  is  so. 
In  the  alcyonide  polyp  many  individuals  are  pernianently 
utnfed  together :  in  this  genus  they  are  temporarily  united, 

*  A   General   Outline  of  the  Animal  Kingdom.     By  Professor  T.  R, 
Jones,  F.G.S. 


THE   LAW    OF   INDIVIDUATION.  479 

in  so  far  as  particular  individuals  are  concerned,  but  oth 
erwise  permanently  so;  for  there  is  always  a  group,  though 
that  group  keeps  changing  its  members.  Indeed,  may  we 
not  say  that  the  "..tendency  to  individuation  "  is  here  most 
visible ;  seeing  that  the  ffydrce  are,  as  it  were,  perpetually 
striving  to  become  individuals,  without  succeeding  ?  And 
may  we  not  further  say  that  in  the  gradually-decreasing 
recurrence  of  this  budding,  and  the  simultaneous  appear 
ance  of  a  higher  method  of  reproduction  by  ova  (which 
in  the  JBryozoa  coexists  with  a  comparatively  languid 
gemmation),  this  "tendency  to  individuation"  is  still  fur 
ther  manifested  ? 

After  complete  separateness  of  organisms  has  been  ar 
rived  at,  the  law  is  still  seen  in  successive  improvements 
of  structure.  By  greater  individuality  of  parts — by 
greater  distinctness  in  the  nature  and  functions  of  these, 
are  all  creatures  possessing  high  vitality  distinguished 
from  inferior  ones.  Those  Hydros  just  referred  to,  which 
are  mere  bags,  with  tentacles  round  the  orilice,  may  be 
turned  inside  out  with  impunity :  the  stomach  becomes 
skin,  and  the  skin  stomach.  Here,  then,  is  evidently  no 
speciality  of  character;  the  duties  of  stomach  and  skin 
are  performed  by  one  tissue,  which  is  not  yet  individual 
ized  into  two  separate  parts,  adapted  to  separate  ends. 
Tire  contrast  between  this  state  and  that  in  which  such  a 
distinction  exists,  will  sufficiently  explain  what  is  meant  by 
individuation  of  organs.  How  clearly  this  individuation 
of  organs  is  traceable  throughout  the  whole  range  of  ani 
mal  life,  may  be  seen  in  the  successive  forms  which  the 
nervous  system  assumes.  Thus  in  the  Acrita,  a  class  com 
prehending  all  the  genera  above  mentioned,  "  no  nervous 
filaments  or  masses  have  been  discovered,  and  the  neurinc 
or  nervous  matter  is  supposed  to  be  diffused  in  a  molecular 
condition  through  the  body."  *  In  the  class  next  above 

*  Jones. 


480  GENERAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

this,  the  Nematoneura,  we  find  the  first  step  toward  indi- 
viduation  of  "  the  nervous  system :  the  nervous  matter  is 
distinctly  aggregated  into  filaments."  *  In  the  Jfomo- 
gangliata,  it  is  still  further  concentrated  into  a  number  of 
small  equal-sized  masses — ganglia.  In  the  Heteroganglia- 
ta,  some  of  these  small  masses  are  collected  together  into 
larger  ones.  Finally,  in  the  Vertebrata,  the  greater  part 
of  the  nervous  centres  are  united  to  form  a  brain.  And 
with  the  rest  of  the  body  there  has  simultaneously  taken 
place  just  the  same  process  of  condensation  into  distinct 
systems — muscular,  respiratory,  nutritive,  excretive,  ab 
sorbent,  circulatory,  &c., — and  of  these  again  into  separate 
parts,  with  special  functions. 

The  changes  of  vital  manifestation  associated  with  and 
consequent  upon  these  changes  of  structure,  have  the 
same  significance.  To  possess  a  greater  variety  of  senses, 
of  instincts,  of  powers,  of  qualities — to  be  more  complex 
in  character  and  attributes,  is  to  be  more  completely  dis 
tinguishable  from  all  other  created  things ;  or  to  exhibit  a 
more  marked  individuality.  For,  manifestly,  as  there  are 
some  properties  which  all  entities,  organic  and  inorganic, 
have  in  common,  namely,  weight,  mobility,  inertia,  &c. ; 
and  as  there  are  additional  properties  which  all  organic 
entities  have  in  common,  namely,  powers  of  growth  and 
multiplication;  and  as  there  are  yet  further  properties 
which  the  higher  organic  entities  have  in  common,  namely, 
sight,  hearing,  &c. ;  then  those  still  higher  organic  entities 
possessing  characteristics  not  shared  in  by  the  rest,  thereby 
diifer  from  a  larger  number  of  entities  than  the  rest,  and 
differ  in  more  points — that  is,  are  more  separate,  more  in 
dividual.  Observe,  again,  that  the  greater  power  of  self- 
preservation  shown  by  beings  of  superior  type  may  also 
be  generalized  under  this  same  term — a  "  tendency  to  in- 
dividuation."  The  lower  the  organism,  the  more  is  it  at 

*  Jones. 


THE   FINAL    ENDOWMENT   OF    HUMANITY.  481 

the  mercy  of  external  circumstances.  It  is  continually 
liable  to  be  destroyed  by  the  elements,  by  want  of  food, 
by  enemies ;  and  eventually  is  so  destroyed  in  nearly  all 
cases.  That  is,  it  lacks  power  to  preserve  its  individual 
ity  ;  and  loses  this,  either  by  returning  to  the  form  of  in 
organic  matter,  or  by  absorption  into  some  other  individ- 
ality.  Conversely,  where  there  is  strength,  sagacity, 
swiftness  (all  of  them  indicative  of  superior  structure), 
there  is  corresponding  ability  to  maintain  life — to  prevent 
the  individuality  from  being  so  easily  dissolved ;  and  there 
fore  the  individuation  is  more  complete. 

(In  man  we  see  the  highest  manifestation  of  this  ten 
dency.  By  virtue  of  his  complexity  of  structure,  he  is 
furthest  removed  from  the  inorganic  world  in  which  there 
is  least  individuality.  Again,  his  intelligence  and  adapta 
bility  commonly  enable  him  to  maintain  life  to  old  age — 
to  complete  the  cycle  of  his  existence ;  that  is,  to  fill  out 
the  limits  of  this  individuality  to  the  full.  Again,  he  is 
self-conscious;  that  is, he  recognizes  his  own  individuality. 
And,  as  lately  shown,  even  the  change  observable  in  human 
affairs,  is  still  toward  a  greater  development  of  individ- 
ality — may  still  be  described  as  "  a  tendency  to  individua 
tion." 

But  note  lastly,  and  note  chiefly,  as  being  the  fact  to 
which  the  foregoing  sketch  is  introductory,  that  what  we 
call  the  moral  law — the  law  of  equal  freedom,  is  the  law 
under  which  individuation  becomes  perfect ;  and  that  abil 
ity  to  recognize  and  act  up  to  this  law,  is  the  final  endow 
ment  of  humanity — an  endowment  now  in  process  of  evo 
lution.  The  increasing  assertion  of  personal  rights,  is  an 
increasing  demand  that  the  external  conditions  needful  to 
a  complete  unfolding  of  the  individuality  shall  be  respect 
ed.  Not  only  is  there  now  a  consciousness  of  individual 
ity,  and  an  intelligence  whereby  individuality  may  be  pre- 
nerved ;  but  there  is  a  perception  that  the  sphere  of  action 
21 


482  GENEKAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

requisite  for  due  development  of  the  individuality  may  be 
claimed ;  and  a  correlative  desire  to  claim  it.  vAnd  when 
the  change  at  present  going  on  is  complete — when  each 
possesses  an  active  instinct  of  freedom,  together  with  an 
active  sympathy — then  will  all  the  still  existing  limita 
tions  to  individuality,  be  they  governmental  restraints,  or 
be  they  the  aggressions  of  men  on  one  another,  cease. 
Then,  none  will  be  hindered  from  duly  unfolding  their  na- 
s  f  tures ;  for  whilst  every  one  maintains  his  own  claims,  he 
will  respect  the  like  claims  of  others.  Then,  there  will  no 
longer  be  legislative  restrictions  and  legislative  burdens ; 
for  by  the  same  process  these  will  have  become  both  need- 
.  less  and  impossible.  Then,  for  the  first  time  in  the  history 
of  the  world,  will  there  exist  beings  whose  individualities 
can -be  expanded  to  the  full  in  all  directions.  And  thus, 
as  before  said,  in  the  ultimate  man  perfect  morality,  per 
fect  indhdduation,  and  perfect  life  will  be  simultaneously 
realized.  / 

V s 

§  13,  Yet  must  this  highest  individuation  be  joined 
with  the  greatest  mutual  dependence.)  Paradoxical  though 
the  assertion  looks,  the  progress  is  at  once  toward  com 
plete  separateness  and  complete  union.  But  the  separate- 
ness  is  of  a  kind  consistent  with  the  most  complex  combi- 
v nations  for  fulfilling  social  wants;  and  the  union  is  of  a 
kind  that  does  not  hinder  entire  development  of  each  per 
sonality.  Civilization  is  evolving  a  state  of  things  and  a 
kind  of  character,  in  which  two  apparently  conflicting  re 
quirements  are  reconciled.  To  achieve  the  creative  pur 
pose—the  greatest  sum  of  happiness,  there  must  on  the 
one  hand  exist  an  amount  of  population  maintainable  only 
by  the  best  possible  system  of  production;  that  is,  by  the 
most  elaborate  subdivision  of  labour ;  that  is,  by  the  ex- 
tremest  mutual  dependence:  whilst  on  the  other  hand, 
each  individual  must  have  the  opportunity  to  do  whatever 


INDIVIDUATION   AND  MUTUAL   DEPENDENCE.          483 

his  desires  prompt.  Clearly  these  two  conditions  can  be 
harmonized  only  by  that  adaptation  humanity  is  undergo 
ing — that  process  during  which  all  desires  inconsistent 
with  the  most  perfect  social  organization  are  dying  out, 
and  other  desires  corresponding  to  such  an  organization 
are  being  developed.  How  this  will  eventuate  in  produc 
ing  at  once  perfect  individuation  and  perfect  mutual  de 
pendence,  may  not  be  at  once  obvious.  But  probably  an 
illustration  will  sufficiently  elucidate  the  matter.  Here 
are  certain. domestic  affections,  which  can  be  gratified  only 
by  the  establishment  of  relationships  with  other  beings. 
In  the  absence  of  those  beings,  and  the  consequent  dor 
mancy  of  the  feelings  with  which  they  are  regarded,  life 
is  incomplete — the  individuality  is  shorn  of  its  fair  propor 
tions.  Now  as  the  normal  unfolding  of  the  conjugal  and 
parental  elements  of  the  individuality  depends  on  having 
a  family,  so,  when  civilization  becomes  complete,  will  the 
normal  unfolding  of  all  o.ther  elements  of  the  individuality 
depend  upon  the  existence  of  the  civilized  state.  Just 
that  kind  of  individuality  will  be  acquired  which  finds  in 
the  most  highly-organized  community  the  fittest  sphere 
for  its  manifestation — which  finds  in  each  social  arrange 
ment  a  condition  answering  to  some  faculty  in  itself — 
which  could  not,  in  fact,  expand  at  all,  if  otherwise  cir 
cumstanced.  The  ultimate  man  will  be  one  whose  private 
requirements  coincide  with  public  ones.  He  will  be  that 
manner  of  man,  who,  in  spontaneously  fulfilling  his  own 
nature,  incidentally  performs  the  functions  of  a  social  unit ; 
and  yet  is  only  enabled  so  to  fulfil  his  own  nature,  by  all 
others  doing  the  like. 

§  14.  CHow  truly,  indeed,  human  progress  is  toward 
greater  mutual  dependence,  as  well  as  toward  greater  in 
dividuation — how  truly  the  welfare  of  each  is  daily  more 
involved  in  the  welfare  of  alL^— and  how  truly,  therefore, 


484:  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

it  is  the  interest  of  each  to  respect  the  interests  of  all, 
may,  with  advantage,  be  illustrated  at  length ;  for  it  is  a 
fact  of  which  many  seem  wofully  ignorant.  Men  can 
not  break  that  vital  law  of  the  social  organism — the 
law  of  equal  freedom,  without  penalties  in  some  way  or 
other  coming  round  to  them.  Being  themselves  members 
of  the  community,  they  are  affected  by  whatever  affects 
it.  Upon  the  goodness  or  badness  of  its  state  depends  the 
greater  or  less  efficiency  with  which  it  administers  to  their 
wants ;  and  the  less  or  greater  amount  of  evil  it  inflicts 
upon  them.  Through  those  vicious  arrangements  that 
hourly  gall  them,  they  feel  the  cumulative  result  of  all 
sins  against  the  social  law ;  their  own  sins  included.  And 
they  suffer  for  these  sins,  not  only  in  extra  restraints  and 
alarms,  but  in  the  extra  labour  and  expense  required  to 
compass  their  ends. 

That  every  trespass  produces  a  reaction,  partly  general 
and  partly  special — a  reaction  which  is  extreme  in  propor 
tion  as  the  trespass  is  great,  has  been  more  or  less  noticed 
in  all  ages.  Thus  the  remark  is  as  old  as  the  time  of 
Thales,  that  tyrants  rarely  die  natural  deaths.  From  his 
day  to  ours,  the  thrones  of  the  East  have  been  continually 
stained  with  the  blood  of  their  successive  occupants. 
The  early  histories  of  all  European  states,  and  the  recent 
history  of  Russia,  illustrate  the  same  fact ;  and  if  we  are 
to  judge  by  his  habits,  the  present  Czar  lives  in  constant 
fear  of  assassination.  Nor  is  it  true  that  those  who  bear 
universal  sway,  and  seem  able  to  do  as  they  please,  can 
really  do  so.  They  limit  their  own  freedom  in  limiting 
that  of  others :  their  despotism  recoils,  and  puts  them  also 
in  bondage.  We  read,  for  instance,  that  the  Roman  em 
perors  were  the  puppets  of  their  soldiers.  "  In  the  By 
zantine  palace,"  says  Gibbon,  "  the  emperor  was  the  first 
slave  of  the  ceremonies  he  imposed."  Speaking  of  the 
tedious  etiquette  of  the  time  of  Louis  le  Grand,  Madame 


UNITY   OF    HUMAN   INTERESTS.  485 

dc  Maintenon  remarks,  "  Save  those  only  who  till  the  high 
est  stations,  I  know  of  none  more  unfortunate  than  those 
who  envy  them.  If  you  could  only  form  an  idea  of  what 
it  is ! "  The  same  reaction  is  felt  by  slave-owners.  Some 
of  the  West  India  planters  have  acknowledged  that  before 
negro  emancipation  they  were  the  greatest  slaves  on  their 
estates.  The  Americans,  too,  are  shackled  in  various  ways 
by  their  own  injustice.  In  the  south,  the  whites  are  self- 
coerced,  that  they  may  coerce  the  blacks.  Marriage  with 
one  of  the  mixed  race  is  forbidden ;  there  is  a  slave-owning 
qualification  for  senators ;  a  man  may  not  liberate  his  own 
slaves  without  leave ;  and  only  at  the  risk  of  lynching 
dare  any  one  say  a  word  in  favour  of  abolition. 

It  is,  indeed,  becoming  clear  to  most  that  these  gross 
transgressions  return  upon  the  perpetrators — that  "this 
even-handed  justice  commends  the  ingredients  of  our  poi 
soned  chalice  to  our  own  lips ;  "  but  it  is  not  yet  clear  to 
them  that  the  like  is  true  of  those  lesser  transgressions 
they  are  themselves  guilty  of.  Probably  the  modern 
maintainers  of  class  power  can  see  well  enough  that  their 
feudal  ancestors  paid  somewhat  dearly  for  keeping  the 
masses  in  thraldom.  They  can  see  that,  what  with  armous 
and  hidden  mail,  what  with  sliding  panels,  secret  passages, 
dimly-lighted  rooms,  precautions  against  poison,  and  con 
stant  fears  of  surprise  and  treachery,  these  barons  had  but 
uncomfortable  lives  of  it  at  the  best.  They  can  see  how 
delusive  was  the  notion  that  the  greatest  wealth  was  to  be 
obtained  by  making  serfs  of  the  people.  They  can  see 
that  in  Jacqueries  and  Gallician  massacres,  when  bonds 
men  glut  their  vengeance  by  burning  castles  and  slaugh 
tering  the  inmates,  there  arrive  fatal  settlements  of  long 
standing  balances.  But  they  cannot  see  that  their  own 
inequitable  deeds,  in  one  way  or  other,  come  home  to 
them.  Just  as  these  feudal  nobles  mistook  the  evils  they 
Buffered  under  for  unalterable  ordinations  of  nature,  never 


486  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

dreaming  that  they  were  the  reflex  results  of  tyranny,  so 
do  their  descendants  fail  to  perceive  that  many  of  their 
own  unhappinesses  are  similarly  generated. 

And  yet,  whilst  in  some  cases  it  is  scarcely  possible  to 
trace  the  secret  channels  through  which  ojur  misbehaviour., 
to  others  returns  upon  us,  there  are  other  cases  in  which 
the  reaction  is  palpable.  An  audience  rushing  out  of  a 
theatre  on  fire,  and  in  their  eagerness  to  get  before  each 
other  jamming  up  the  doorway  so  that  no  one  can  get 
through,  offers  a  good  example  of  unjust  selfishness  de 
feating  itself.  An  analogous  result  may  be  witnessed  at 
the  American  ordinaries,  where  the  attempts  of  greedy 
guests  to  get  more  than  a  fair  share,  have  generated  a 
competition  in  fast  eating  which  not  only  frustrates  these 
attempts,  but  entails  on  all,  immediate  loss  of  enjoyment 
and  permanent  ill-health.  In  such  cases  it  is  clear  enough, 
that  by  trespassing  upon  the  claims  of  others,  men  hurt 
themselves  also.  The  reaction  is  here  direct  and  imme 
diate.  In  all  other  cases,  however,  reaction  is  equally 
sure,  though  it  may  come  round  by  some  circuitous  route, 
or  after  a  considerable  lapse  of  time,  or  in  an  unrecognized 
form.  The  country  squire  who  thinks  it  a  piece  of  pro 
found  policy  to  clear  his  estate  of  cottages,  that  he  may 
saddle  some  other  place  with  the  paupers,  forgets  that 
landowners  in  neighbouring  parishes  will  eventually  defeat 
him  by  doing  the  same ;  or  that  if  he  is  so  situated  as  to 
settle  his  labourers  upon  towns,  the  walking  of  extra  miles 
to  and  fro  must  gradually  lower  the  standard  of  a  day's 
work,  raise  the  cost  of  cultivation,  and,  in  the  end,  de 
crease  rent.  ISTor  does  he  see  that  by  the  overcrowded 
bedrooms  and  neglected  drainage  and  repairs  to  which 
this  policy  leads,  he  is  generating  debility  or  disease,  and 
raising  his  poors'-rates  in  one  way,  whilst  he  lowers  them 
in  another.  The  Dorsetshire  former  who  pays  w^ages  in 
tailings  of  wheat  charged  above  market  price,  imagines 


REACTIONS   OF   EVIL   CONDUCT.  487 

he  is  economizing.  It  never  occurs  to  him  that  he  loses 
more  than  the  difference  by  petty  thefts,  by  the  destruc 
tion  of  his  hedges  for  fuel,  by  the  consequent  pounding 
of  his  cattle,  and  by  the  increase  t>f  county-rates,  for  the 
prosecution  of  robbers  and  poachers.  It  seems  very  clear 
to  the  tradesman  that  all  extra  profit  made  by  adulterating 
goods,  is  so  much  pure  gain ;  and  for  a  while,  perhaps,  it 
may  be.  By-and-by,  however,  his  competitors  do  as  he 
does — are  in  a  measure  compelled  to  do  so — and  the  rate 
of  profit  is  then  brought  down  to  what  it  was  before. 
Meanwhile  the  general  practice  of  adulteration  has  been 
encouraged — has  got  into  other  departments — has  dete 
riorated  the  articles  our  shopkeeper  buys ;  and  thus,  in  his 
capacity  of  consumer,  he  suffers  from  the  vicious  system 
he  has  helped  to  strengthen.  When,  during  negro  ap 
prenticeship,  the  West  India  planters  had  to  value  slaves 
wlio  wished  to  buy  themselves  off,  before  "  the  Queen's 
free,"  they  no  doubt  thought  it  cunning  to  make  oath  to 
a  higher  worth  per  day  than  the  true  one.  But  when, 
awhile  after,  having  to  pay  wages,  they  had  their  own  es 
timates  quoted  to  them,  and  found  that  the  negroes  would 
take  nothing  less,  they  probably  repented  of  their  dishon 
esty.  It  is  often  long  before  these  recoils  come ;  but  they 
do  come,  nevertheless.  See  how  the  Irish  landlords  are  at 
length  being  punished  for  their  rack-renting,  their  evic 
tions,  their  encouragement  of  middlemen,  and  their  utter 
recklessness  of  popular  welfare.  Note,  too,  how  for  hav 
ing  abetted  those  who  wronged  the  native  Irish,  England 
has  to  pay  a  penalty,  in  the  shape  of  loans  which  are  not 
refunded,  and  in'the  misery  produced  by  the  swarms  of 
indigent  immigrants,  who  tend  to  bring  down  her  own 
people  to  their  level.  Thus,  be  they  committed  by  many 
or  by  few — be  they  seen  in  efforts  to  despoil  foreigners  by 
restrictive  duties,  or  in  a  tradesman's  trickeries — breaches 
of  equity  are  uniformly  self-defeating.  (  Whilst  men  con- 


488  GENEKAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

tinue  social  units,  they  cannot  transgress  the  life  principle 
of  society  without  disastrous  xconsequences  somehow  or 
other  coming  back  upon  them.  ) 

§  15.  Not  only  does  the  ultimate  welfare  of  the 
citizen  demand  that  he  should  himself  conform  to  the 
moral  law ;  it  equally  concerns  him  that  every  one  should 
conform  to  it.  This  interdependence  which  the  social  state 
necessitates  makes  all  men's  business  his  business,  in  a 
more  or  less  indirect  way.  To  people  whose  eyes  do  not 
wander  beyond  their  ledgers,  it  seems  of  no  consequence 
how  the  aifairs  of  mankind  go.  They  think  they  know 
better  than  to  trouble  themselves  with  public  matters, 
making  enemies  and  damaging  their  trade.  Yet  if  they 
are^ndeed  so  selfish  as  to  care  nothing  about  their  fellow- 
creatures,  whilst  their  own  flesh-pots  are  well-filled,  let 
them  learn  that  they  have  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence  in 
terest  at  stake.  Mere  pocket  prudence  should  induce  them 
to  further  human  welfare,  if  no  higher  motive  will.  To_ 
.help  in  putting  things  on  a  juster  footing  will  eventually 
pay.  The  diffusion  of  sound  principles  and  the  improve 
ment  of  public  morality,  end  in  diminishing  household  ex 
penses.  Can  they  not  see  that  when  buying  meat  and 
bread  and  groceries,  they  have  to  give  something  toward 
maintaining  prisons  and  police  ?  Can  they  not  see  that 
in  the  price  of  a  coat  they  are  charged  a  large  percentage 
to  cover  the  tailor's  bad  debts?  Every  transaction  of 
their  lives  is  in  some  way  hampered  by  the  general  immo 
rality.  They  feel  it  in  the  rate  of  interest  demanded  for 
capital,  which  (neglecting  temporary  variations)  is  high  in 
proportion  as  men  are  bad.*  They  feel  it  in  the  amount 
of  attorneys'  bills ;  or  in  having  to  suffer  robbery,  lest  the 

*  When  dishonesty  and  improvidence  are  extreme,  capital  cannot  be 
had  under  30  to  40  per  cent.,  as  in  the  Burmese  empire,  or  in  England,  in 
the  time  of  King  John. — Sec  Mill's  Political  Economy. 


MONEY  VALUE  OF  MORAL  RECTITUDE.       489 

law  should  commit  on  them  greater  robbery.  They  feel 
it  in  their  share  of  the  two  and  a  half  millions  a  year, 
which  our  metallic  currency  costs.  They  feel  it  in  those 
collapses  of  trade,  which  follow  extensive  gambling  spec 
ulations.  It  seems  to  them  an  absurd  waste  of  time  to 
help  in  spreading  independence  amongst  men ;  and  yet,  did 
they  call  to  mind  how  those  railway  shares,  which  they 
bought  at  a  premium,  went  down  to  a  ruinous  discount 
because  the  directors  cringed  to  a  rich  bully,  they  would 
learn  that  the  prevalence  of  a  manly  spirit  may  become 
of  money-value  to  them.  They  suppose  themselves  un 
concerned  in  the  quarrels  of  neighbouring  nations ;  and 
yet,  on  examination,  they  will  find  that  a  Hungarian  war 
by  the  loans  it  calls  for,  or  a  Danish  blockade  by  its  influ 
ence  upon  our  commerce,  more  or  less  remotely  affects 
their  profits,  in  whatever  secluded  nook  of  England  they 
may  live.  Their  belief  is  that  they  are  not  at  all  interested 
in  the  good  government  of  India ;  and  yet  a  little  reflection 
would  show  them  that  they  continually  suffer  from  those 
fluctuations  of  trade  consequent  upon  the  irregular  and 
insufficient  supply  of  cotton  from  America — fluctuations 
which  would  probably  have  ceased,  had  not  India  been 
exhausted  by  its  rulers'  extravagance.  Not  interested  ? 
Why  even  the  better  education  of  the  Chinese  is  of  mo 
ment  to  them,  for  Chinese  prejudice  shuts  out  English 
merchants.  ISTot  interested  ?  Why  they  have  a  stake  in 
the  making  of  American  railways  and  canals,  for  these 
ultimately  affect  the  price  of  bread  in  England.  Not  in-" 
terested?  Why  the  accumulation  of  wealth  by  every 
people  on  the  face  of  the  earth  concerns  them ;  for  whilst 
it  is  the  law  of  capital  to  overflow  from  those  places  where 
it  is  abundant,  to  those  where  it  is  scarce,  rich  nations  can 
never  fully  enjoy  the  fruits  of  their  own  labour  until  other 
nations  are  equally  rich.  The  well-ordering  of  human  af 
fairs  in  the  remotest  and  most  insignificant  communities  is 
21* 


490  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

beneficial  to  all  men :  the  ill-ordering  of  them  calamitous 
to  all  men.  And  though  the  citizen  may  be  but  slightly 
acted  upon  by  each  particular  good  or  evil  influence  at 
work  within  his  own  society,  and  still  more  slightly  by 
each  of  those  at  work  within  other  societies — although 
the  effect  on  him  may  be  infinitesimal,  yet  it  is  on  the 
cumulative  result  of  myriads  of  these  infinitesimal  in 
fluences  that  his  happiness  or  misery  depends 

§  16.  Still  more  clearly  seen  is  this  ultimate  identity 
of  personal  interests ancTsocial  interests,  when  we  discover 
how  essentially  vital  is  the  connection  between  each  per 
son  and  the  society  of  which  he  is  a  unit.  We  commonly 
enough  compare  a  nation  to  a  living  organism.  We  speak 
of  "  the  body  politic,"  of  the  functions  of  its  several  parts, 
of  its  growth,  and  of  its  diseases,  as  though  it  were  a  crea 
ture.  But  we  usually  employ  these  expressions  as  meta 
phors,  little  suspecting  how  close  is  the  analogy,  and  how 
far  it  will  bear  carrying  out.  So  completely,  however,  is  q, 
society  organized  upon  the  same  system  as  an  individual  be 
ing,  that  we  may  almost  say  there  is  something  more  than 
analogy  between  them.  Let  us  look  at  a  few  of  the  facts. 

Observe  first,  that  the  parallel  gains  immensely  in  rea 
sonableness,  when  we  learn  that  the  human  body  is  itself 
compounded  of  innumerable  microscopic  organisms,  which 
possess  a  kind  of  independent  vitality,  which  grow  by 
imbibing  nutriment  from  the  circulating  fluids,  and  which 
multiply,  as  the  infusorial  monads  do,  by  spontaneous  fis 
sion.  The  whole  process  of  development,  beginning  with 
the  first  change  in  the  ovum,  and  ending  with  the  produc 
tion  of  an  adult  man,  is  fundamentally  a  perpetual  increase 
in  the  number  of  these  cells  by  the  mode  of  fissiparous 
generation.  On  the  other  hand,  that  gradual  decay 
witnessed  in  old  age,  is  in  essence  a  cessation  of  this  in 
crease.  During  health,  the  vitality  of  these  cells  is  subor- 


UHIVE 
S&j 

EFFECTS    OF   MORBID   CELL-GROWTHS.      ^      491 


dinated  to  that  of  the  system  at  large ;  and  the  presence 
of  insubordinate  cells  implies  disease.  Thus,  small-pox 
arises  from  the  intrusion  of  a  species  of  cell,  foreign  to 
that  community  of  cells  of  which  the  body  consists,  and 
which,  absorbing  nourishment  from  the  blood,  rapidly 
multiplies  by  spontaneous  division,  until  its  progeny  have 
diffuse^  themselves  throughout  the  tissues ;  and  if  the  ex 
creting  energies  of  the  constitution  fail  to  get  rid  of  these 
aliens,  death  ensues.  In  certain  states  of  body,  indigenous 
cells  will  take  on  new  forms  of  life,  and  by  continuing  to 
reproduce  their  like,  give  origin  to  parasitic  growths,  such 
as  cancer.  Under  the  microscope,  cancer  can  be  identi 
fied  by  a  specific  element,  known  as  the  cancer-cell. 
Besides  those  modifications  of  cell-vitality,  which  consti 
tute  malignant  diseases,  there  occasionally  happens  another 
in  which  cells,  without  any  change  in  their  essential  na 
ture,  rebel  against  the  general  governing  force  of  the  sys 
tem  ;  and,  instead  of  ceasing  to  grow,  whilst  yet  invisible 
to  the  naked  eye,  expand  to  a  considerable  size,  sometimes 
even  reaching  several  inches  in  diameter.  These  are 
called  Sydatids  or  Acephalocysts*  and  have,  until  lately, 

*  "  The  primitive  forms  of  all  tissues  are  free  cells,  which  grow  by  im 
bibition,  and  which  develop  their  like  from  their  nucleus  of  hyaline.  All 
the  animal  tissues  result  from  transformations  of  these  cells.  It  is  to  such 
cells  that  the  acephalocyst  bears  the  closest  analogies  in  physical,  chemical, 
and  vital  properties.  *  *  *  *  We  may,  with  some  truth,  say  that 
the  human  body  is  primarily  composed  or  built  up  of  acephalocysts ;  micro 
scopical,  indeed,  and  which,  under  natural  and  healthy  conditions,  are 
metamorphosed  into  cartilage,  bone,  nerve,  muscular  fibre,  &c.  When,  in 
stead  of  such  change,  the  organic  cells  grow  to  dimensions  which  make 
them  recognizable  to  the  naked  eye,  such  development  of  acephalocysts,  as 
they  are  then  called,  is  commonly  connected  in  the  human  subject  with  an 
enfeeblement  of  the  controlling  plastic  force,  which,  at  some  of  the  weaker 
points  of  the  frame,  seems  unable  to  direct  the  metamorphosis  of  the  primi 
tive  cells  along  the  right  road  to  the  tissues  they  were  destined  to  form,  but 
permits  them  to  retain,  as  it  were,  their  embryo  condition,  and  to  grow  by 
the  imbibition  of  the  surrounding  fluid,  and  thus  become  the  means  of  in- 


492  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

been  taken  for  internal  parasites  or  entozoa.  Still  closer 
appears  the  relationship  between  tissue-cells  and  the  low 
est  independent  organisms,  on  finding  that  there  exists  a 
creature  called  the  Gregarina,  very  similar  in  structure 
to  the  Hydatid,  but  which  is  admitted  to  be  an  entozoon. 
Consisting  as  it  does  of  a  cell-membrane,  inclosing  fluid 
and  a  solid  nucleus,  and  multiplying  as  it  does  by 
the  spontaneous  fission  of  this  nucleus  and  subsequent 
division  of  the  cell-walls,  the  Gregarina  differs  from  a 
tissue-cell  merely  in  size,  and  in  not  forming  part  of  the 
organ  containing  it.*  Thus  there  may  coexist  in  the 
same  organism  cells  of  which  that  organism  is  constituted, 

juriously  affecting  or  destroying  the  tissues  which  they  should  have  sup 
ported  and  repaired.  I  regard  the  different  Acephalocysts,  therefore,  as 
merely  so  many  forms  or  species  of  morbid  or  dropsical  cells." — Profecsor 
Owen's  Hunterian  Lectures. 

*  "Schleiden  has  viewed  these  Gregarince  as  essentially  single  organic 
cells,  and  would  refer  them  to  the  lowest  group  of  plants.  And  here,  in 
deed,  we  have  a  good  instance  of  the  essential  unity  of  the  organic  divi 
sion  of  matter.  It  is  only  the  power  of  self-contraction  of  tissue,  and 
its  solubility  in  acetic  acid,  which  turn  the  scale  in  favour  of  the 
animality  of  the  Gregarince  ;  they  have  no  mouth  and  no  stomach,  which 
have  commonly  been  deemed  the  most  constant  organic  characteristics  of 
an  animal." 

"  1846,  Henle  and  others  have  questioned  the  title  of  the  Grcgarina  to 
be  regarded  as  an  organic  species  or  individual  at  all,  or  as  any  thing  more 
than  a  monstrous  cell:  thus  applying  to  it  my  idea,  propounded  in  1843,  of 
the  true  nature  of  the  acephalocyst." 

"1848,  Kollicker  has  recently  published  an  elaborate  memoir  on  the 
genus,  in  which  good  and  sufficient  grounds  are  given  for  concluding  that 
the  Gregarina  not  merely  resembles,  but  actually  is  an  animated  cell ;  it 
stands  on  the  lowest  step  of  the  animal  series,  parallel  with  that  of  the 
single-celled  species  of  the  vegetable  kingdom.  The  Gregarina  con 
sists,  as  Schleiden  and  others  have  well  shown,  of  a  cell-membrane, 
of  the  fluid  and  granular  contents  of  the  cell,  and  of  the  nucleus  with 
(occasional)  nucleoli.  The  nucleus  is  the  hardest  part,  resisting  pres- 
tfure  longest,  like  that  of  the  Polygastrian.  It  divides,  and  its  divi 
sion  is  followed  by  spontaneous  fission." — Professor  Owerfs  Hunterian 
Lectures. 


ANALOGIES  OF  THE  LIVING  AND  SOCIAL  ORGANISM.    493 

others  which  should  have  helped  to  build  it  up,  but  which 
are  insubordinate  or  partially  separate,  and  others  which 
are  naturally  separate,  and  simply  reside  in  its  cavities. 
Hence  we  are  warranted  in  considering  the  body  as  a 
commonwealth  of  monads,  each  of  which  has  independent 
powers  of  life,  growth,  and  reproduction ;  each  of  which 
unites  with  a  number  of  others  to  perform  some  function 
needful  for  supporting  itself  and  all  the  rest ;  and  each  of 
which  absorbs  its  share  of  nutriment  from  the  blood.  And 
'when  thus  regarded,  the  analogy  between  an  individual 
being  and  a  human  society,  in  which  each  man,  whilst 
helping  to  subserve  some  public  want,  absorbs  a  portion 
of  the  circulating  stock  of  commodities  brought  to  his 
door,  is  palpable  enough. 

A  still  more  remarkable  fulfilment  of  this  analogy  is 
to  be  found  in  the  fact,  that  the  different  kinds  of  organiza 
tion  which  society  takes  on,  in  progressing  from  its  lowest 
to  its  highest  phase  of  development,  are  essentially  similar 
to  the  different  kinds  of  animal  organization.  Creatures 
of  inferior  type  are  little  more  than  aggregations  of 
numerous  like  parts — are  moulded  on  what  Professor 
Owen  terms  the  principle  of  vegetative  repetition ;  and  in 
tracing  the  forms  assumed  by  successive  grades  above 
these,  we  find  a  gradual  diminution  in  the  number  of  like 
parts,  and  a  multiplication  of  unlike  ones.  In  the  one  ex 
treme  there  are  but  few  functions,  and  many  similar  agents 
to  each  function :  in  the  other,  there  are  many  functions, 
and  few  similar  agents  to  each  function.  Thus  the  visual 
apparatus  in  a  fly  consists  of  two  groups  of  fixed  lenses, 
numbering  in  some  species  20,000.  Every  one  of  these 
lenses  produces  an  image ;  but  as  its  field  of  view  is  ex 
tremely  narrow,  and  as  there  exists  no  power  of  adapta 
tion  to  different  distances,  the  vision  obtained  is  probably 
very  imperfect.  Whilst  the  mammal,  on  the  other  hand, 
possesses  but  two  eyes ;  each  of  these  includes  numerous 


4:94  GENERAL   CONSIDERATIONS. 

appendages.  It  is  compounded  of  several  lenses,  having 
different  forms  and  duties.  These  lenses  are  capable  of 
various  focal  adjustments.  There  are  muscles  for  direct 
ing  them  to  the  right  and  to  the  left,  to  the  ground  and  to 
the  sky.  There  is  a  curtain  (the  iris)  to  regulate  the 
quantity  of  light  admitted.  There  is  a  gland  to  secrete,  a 
tube  to  pour  out,  and  a  drain  to  carry  off  the  lubricating 
fluid.  There  is  a  lid  to  wipe  the  surface,  and  there  are 
lashes  to  give  warning  on  the  approach  of  foreign  bodies. 
Now  the  contrast  between  these  two  kinds  of  visual  organ 
is  the  contrast  between  all  lower  and  higher  types  of 
structure.  If  we  examine  the  framework  employed  to 
support  the  tissues,  we  find  it  consisting  in  the  Annelida 
(the  common  worm,  for  instance)  of  an  extended  series  of 
rings.  In  the  Myriapoda,  which  stand  next  above  the 
Annelida,  these  rings  are  less  numerous  and  more  dense. 
In  the  higher  Myriapoda  they  are  united  into  a  compara 
tively  few  large  and  strong  segments,  whilst  in  the  Insecta 
this  condensation  is  carried  still  further.  Speaking  of 
analogous  changes  in  the  crustaceans,  the  lowest  of  which 
is  constructed  much  as  the  centipede,  and  the  highest  of 
which  (the  crab)  has  nearly  all  its  segments  united,  Pro 
fessor  Jones  says — "  And  even  the  steps  whereby  we  pass 
from  the  Annelidan  to  the  Myriapod,  and  from  thence  to 
the  Insect,  the  Scorpion,  and  the  Spider,  seem"  to  be  re 
peated  as  we  thus  review  the  progressive  development  of 
the  class  before  us."  Mark  again,  that  these  modifications 
of  the  exo-skeleton  are  completely  paralled  by  those  of  the 
endo-skeleton.  The  vertebra  are  numerous  in  fish  and  in 
the  ophidian  reptiles.  They  are  less  numerous  in  the  higher 
reptiles ;  less  numerous  still  in  the  quadrupeds ;  fewest  of 
all  in  man :  and  whilst  their  number  is  diminished,  their 
forms  and  the  functions  of  their  appendages  are  varied, 
instead  of  being,  as  in  the  eel,  nearly  all  alike.  Thus,  also, 
is  it  with  locomotive  organs.  The  spines  of  the  echinus 


SUBDIVISION   OF   SOCIAL   FUNCTIONS.  495 

and  the  suckers  of  the  star-fish  are  multitudinous.  So  like 
wise  are  the  legs  of  the  centipede.  In  the  crustaceans  we 
come  down  to  fourteen,  twelve,  and  ten ;  in  the  arachni- 
dans  and  insects  to  eight  and  six ;  in  the  lower  mammalia 
to  four ;  and  in  man  to  two.  The  successive  modifications 
of  the  digestive  cavity  are  of  analogous  nature.  Its  lowest 
form  is  that  of  a  sack  with  but  one  opening.  Next  it  is  a 
tube  with  two  openings,  having  different  offices.  And  in 
higher  creatures,  this  tube,  instead  of  being  made  up  of 
absorbents  from  end  to  end — that  is,  instead  of  being  an 
aggregation  of  like  parts — is  modified  into  many  unlike 
ones,  having  different  structures  adapted  to  the  different 
stages  into  which  the  assimilative  function  is  now  divided. 
Even  the  classification  under  which  man,  as  forming  the 
genus  JBimana,  is  distinguished  from  the  most  nearly 
related  genus  Quadrwnana,  is  based  on  a  diminution  in 
the  number  of  organs  that  have  similar  forms  and  duties. 
Now  just  this  same  coalescence  of  like  parts,  and  sep 
aration  of  unlike  ones — just  this  same  increasing  subdivi 
sion  of  functions — takes  place  in  the  development  society. 
The  earliest  social  organisms  consist  almost  wholly  of 
repetitions  of  one  element.  I*  Every  man  is  a  warrior, 
hunter,  fisherman,  builder,  agriculturist,  toolmaker. 
Each  portion  of  the  community  performs  the  same  duties 
with  every  other  portion ;  much  as  each  portion  of  the 
polyp's  body  is  alike  stomach,  skin,  and  lungs.  Even  the 
chiefs,  in  whom  a  tendency  toward  separateness  of  func 
tion  first  appears,  still  retain  their  similarity  to  the  rest  in 
economic  respects. '  /The  next  stage  is  distinguished  by  a 
segregation  of  these  social  units  into  a  few  distinct  classes 
— soldiers,  priests,  and  labourers.  A  further  advance  is 
seen  in  tW  sundering  of  these  labourers  into  different 
castes,  having  special  occupations,  as  amongst  the  Hindoos. 
And,  without  further  illustration,  the  reader  will  at  once 
perceive,  that  from  these  inferior  types  of  society  up  to 


4:96  GENEEAL    CONSIDERATIONS. 

our  own  complicated  and  more  perfect  one,  the  progress 
has  ever  been  of  the  same  nature.  Whilst  he  will  also 
perceive  that  this  coalescence  of  like  parts,  as  seen  in  the 
concentration  of  particular  manufactures  in  particular  dis 
tricts,  and  this  separation  of  agents  having  separate  func 
tions,  as  seen  in  the  more  and  more  minute  division  of 
labour,  are  still  going  on. 

Significant  of  the  alleged  analogy  is  the  further  fact 
consequent  upon  the  above,  that  the  sensitiveness  exhibited 
by  societies  of  low  and  high  structure  differs  in  degree,  as 
does  the  sensitiveness  of  similarly-contrasted  creatures. 
That  peculiar  faculty  possessed  by  inferior  organisms  of  liv 
ing  on  in  each  part  after  being  cut  in  pieces,  is  a  manifest 
corollary  to  the  other  peculiarity  just  described ;  namely, 
that  they  consist  of  many  repetitions  of  the  same  elements. 
The  ability  of  the  several  portions  into  which  a  polyp  has 
been  divided,  to  grow  into  complete  polyps,  obviously 
implies  that  each  portion  contains  all  the  organs  needful 
to  life ;  and  each  portion  can  be  thus  constituted  only 
when  those  organs  recur  in  every  part  of  the  original 
body.  Conversely,  the  reason  why  any  member  of  a 
more  highly-organized  being  cannot  live  when  separated 
from  the  rest  is,  that  it  does  not  include  all  the  vital  ele 
ments,  but  is  dependent  for  its  supplies  of  nutriment,  ner 
vous  energy,  oxygen,  &c.,  upon  the  members  from  which 
it  has  been  cut  off.  Of  course,  then,  the  earliest  and  latest 
forms  of  society,  being  similarly  distinguished  in  struc 
ture,  will  be  similarly  distinguished  in  susceptibility  of 
injury.  Hence  it  happens  that  a  tribe  of  savages  may  be 
divided  and  subdivided  with  little  or  no  inconvenience  to 
the  several  sections.  Each  of  these  contains  every  ele 
ment  which  the  whole  did — is  just  as  self-sufficing,  and 
quickly  assumes  the  simple  organization  constituting  an 
independent  tribe.  Hence,  on  the  contrary,  it  happens, 
that  in  a  community  like  our  own  no  part  can  be  cut  off 


TENDENCY   OF    SOCIAL   DEVELOPMENT.  497 

or  injured  without  all  parts  suffering.  Annihilate  the 
agency  employed  in  distributing  commodities,  and  much 
of  the  rest  would  die  before  another  distributing  agency 
could  be  developed.  Suddenly  sever  the  manufacturing 
portion  from  the  agricultural  portion,  and  the  one  would 
expire  outright,  whilst  the  other  would  long  linger  in 
grievous  distress.  This  interdependence  is  daily  shown  in 
commercial  changes.  Let  the  factory  hands  be  put  on 
short  time,  and  immediately  the  colonial  produce  markets 
of  London  and  Liverpool  are  depressed.  The  shop-keeper 
is  busy  or  otherwise,  according  to  the  amount  of  the  wheat 
crop.  And  a  potato-blight  may  ruin  dealers  in  consols. 

Thus  do  we  find,  not  only  that  the  analogy  between  a 
society  and  a  living  creature  is  borne  out  to  a  degree  quite 
unsuspected  by  those  who  commonly  draw  it,  but  also, 
that  the  same  definition  of  life  applies  to  both.  This  union 
of  many  men  into  one  community — this  increasing  mu 
tual  dependence  of  units  which  were  originally  independ 
ent — this  gradual  segregation  of  citizens  into  separate 
bodies,  with  reciprocally  subservient  functions — this  forma 
tion  of  a  whole,  consisting  of  numerous  essential  parts — • 
this  growth  of  an  organism,  of  which  one  portion  cannot 
be  injured  without  the  rest  feeling  it — may  all  be  general-  ' 
ized  under  ^he  law  of  individuation.  The  development 
of  society,  as  well  as  the  development  of  man  and  the 
development  of  life  generally,  may  be  described  as  a  ten 
dency  to  individuate — to,  become  a  thing.  And  rightly 
interpreted,  the  manifold  forms  of  progress  going  on 
around  us,  are  uniformly  significant  of  this  tendency. 

Returning  now  to  the  point  whence  we  set  out,  the 
fact  that  public  interests  and  private  ones  are  essentially 
in  unison,  cannot  fail  to  be  more  vividly  realized,  when  so 
vital  a  connection  is  found  to  subsist  between  society  and 
its  members.  Though  it  would  be  dangerous  to  place 
implicit  trust  in  conclusions  founded  upon  the  analogy 


498  SUMMARY. 

just  traced,  yet  harmonizing  as  they  do  with  conclusions 
deducible  from  every-day  experience,  they  unquestionably 
enforce  these.  When,  after  observing  the  reactions  en 
tailed  by  breaches  of  equity,  the  citizen  contemplates  the 
relation  in  which  he  stands  to  the  body  politic — when  he 
learns  that  it  has  a  species  of  life,  and  conforms  to  the 
same  laws  of  growth,  organization,  and  sensibility  that  a 
being  does — when  he  finds  that  one  vitality  circulates 
through  it  and  him,  and  that  whilst  social  health,  in  a 
measure,  depends  upon  the  fulfilment  of  some  function  in 
which  he  takes  part,  his  happiness  depends  upon  the  nor 
mal  action  of  every  organ  in  the  social  body — when  he 
duly  understands  this,  he  must  see  tha£— his  own  welfare 
and  all  men's  welfare  are  inseparable.  <He  must  see  that 
whatever  produces  a  diseased  state  in  one  part  of  the  com 
munity,  must  inevitably  inflict  injury  upon  all  other  parts) 
He  must  see  that  his  own  life  can  become  what  it  should 
be,  only  as  fast  as  society  becomes  what  it  should  be.  In 
short,  he  must  become  impressed  with  the  salutary  truth, 
that  no  one  can  be  perfectly  free  till  all  are  free ;  no  one 
can  be  perfectly  moral  till  all  are  moral ;  no  one  can  be 
perfectly  happy  till  all  are  happy.  ) 


CHAPTEK    XXXI. 

SUMMARY. 

§  1.  By  bringing  within  narrow  compass  the  evi 
dences  that  have  been  adduced  in  support  of  the  Theory 
of  Equity  now  before  him,  the  reader  will  be  aided  in 
coming  to  a  final  judgment  upon  it. 

At  the  head  of  these  evidences  stands  the  fact  that, 
from  whatever  side  we  commence  the  investigation,  our 


CONVERGENCE    OF   THE   ARGUMENTS.  499 

paths  alike  converge  toward  the  principle  of  which  this 
thgory  is  a  development.  If  we  start  ^ith  an  d  priori  in 
quiry  into  the  conditions  under  which  alone  the  Divine 
Idea — greatest  happiness — can  be  realized,  we  find  that 
conformity  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  the  first  of  them 
(Chap.  III.).  If,  turning  to  man's  constitution,  we  con 
sider  the  means  provided  for  achieving  greatest  happiness, 
we  quickly  reason  our  way  back  to  this  same  condition ; 
seeing  that  these  means  cannot  work  out  their  end,  unless 
the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  submitted  to  (Chap.  IV.).  If, 
pursuing  the  analysis  a  step  further,  we  examine  how  sub 
ordination  to  the  law  of  equal  freedom  is  secured,  we  dis 
cover  certain  faculties  by  which  that  law  is  responded  to 
(Chap.  V.).  If,  again,  we  contemplate  the  phenomena  of 
civilization,  we  perceive  that  the  process  of  adaptation 
under  which  they  may  be  generalized,  can  never  cease  un 
til  men  have  become  instinctively  obedient  to  this  same 
law  of  equal  freedom  (Chap.  II.).  To  all  which  positive 
proofs  may  also  be  added  the  negative  one,  that  to  deny 
this  law  of  equal  freedom  is  to  assert  divers  absurdities 
(Chap.  VI.). 

§  2.  Further  confirmation  may  be  found  in  the  cir 
cumstance  that  preexisting  theories,  which  are  untenable 
as  they  stand,  are  yet  absorbed,  and  the  portion  of  truth 
contained  in  them  assimilated,  by  the  theory  now  pro 
posed.  Thus  the  production  of  the  greatest  happiness, 
though  inapplicable  as  an  immediate  guide  for  men,  is 
nevertheless  the  true  end  of  morality,  regarded  from  the 
Divine  point  of  view ;  and  as  such,  forms  part  of  the  pres 
ent  system  (Chap.  III.).  The  moral-sense  principle,  also, 
whilst  misapplied  by  its  propounders,  is  still  based  on  fact ; 
and,  as  was  shown,  harmonizes  when  rightly  interpreted, 
with  what  seem  conflicting  beliefs,  and  unites  with  them 
to  produce  a  complete  whole.  Add  to  this,  that  the  phi- 


vC\  x  •  n     ^y 

/         <rWtV  ^       XV 

500  SUMMARY. 

losophy  now  contended  for,  includes,  and  affords  a  wider 
application  to,  Adam  Smith's  doctrine  of  sympathy  j(p. 
115);  and  lastly,  that  it  gives  the  finishing  development 
to  Coleridge's  "Idea  of  Life"  (p.  476). 

&  .,.-.— -,7.:-,    ^ 

§  3.  The  power  which  the  proposed  theory  possesses 
of  reducing  the  leading  precepts  of  current  morality  to  a 
scientific  form,  and  of  comprehending  them,  in  company 
tiwith  sundry  less  acknowledged  precepts,  under  one  gen- 
*•  ijeralization,  may  also  be  quoted  as  additional  evidence  in 
its  favour.  Not  as  heretofore  by  considering  whether,  on 
the  whole,  manslaughter  is  productive  of  unhappiness,  or 
otherwise — not  by  inquiring  if  theft  is,  or  is  not,  expe 
dient — not  by  asking  in  the  case  of  slavery  what  are  its 
effects  on  the  common  weal — not  by  any  such  complex 
and  inexact  processes,  neither  by  the  disputable  decisions 
of  unaided  moral  sense,  are  we  here  guided;  but  by  .unde 
niable  inferences  from  a  proved  first  principle.  Nor  are 
only  the  chief  rules  of  right  conduct  and  the  just  order 
ing  of  the  connubial  and  parental  relationships  thus  deter 
mined  for  us  ;  this  same  first  principle  indirectly  gives  dis 
tinct  answers  respecting  the  proper  constitution  of  gov 
ernments,  their  duties,  and  the  limits  to  their  action.  Out 
of  an  endless  labyrinth  of  confused  debate  concerning  the 
policy  of  these  or  those  public  measures,  it  opens  short 
and  easily-discerned  ways ;  and  the  conclusions  it  leads  to 
are  enforced,  both  generally,  by  an  abundant  experience 
of  the  fallacy  of  expediency  decisions,  and  specially,  by 
numerous  arguments  bearing  on  each  successive  question. 
Underlying,  therefore,  as  this  first  principle  does,  so  wide 
a  range  of  duty,  and  applied  as  it  is  by  a  process  of  men 
tal  admeasurement  nearly  related  to  the  geometrical — 
namely,  by  ascertaining  the  equality  or  inequality  of  moral 
quantities  (p.  128) — we  may  consider  that  a  system  of 
ethics  synthetically  developed  from  it,  partakes  of  the 


K 
AGREEMENTS  OF  MOEAL  AND  POLITICAL  ECONOMY.    501 

character  of  an  exact  science ;  and  as  doing  this  possesses 
additional  claims  to  our  confidence. 

§  4.  Again,  the  injunctions  of  the  moral  law,  as 
now  interpreted,  coincide  with  and  anticipate  those  of  po 
litical  economy.  Political  economy  teaches  that  restric 
tions  upon  commerce  are  detrimental :  the  moral  law  de 
nounces  them  as  wrong  (Chap.  XXIII.) .  Political  econ 
omy  tells  us  that  loss  is  entailed  by  a  forced  trade  with 
colonies :  the  moral  law  will  not  permit  such  a  trade  to  be 
established  (Chap.  XX VII).  Political  economy  says  it  is 
good  that  speculators  should  be  allowed  to  operate  on  the 
food-markets  as  they  see  well :  the  law  of  equal  freedom 
(contrary  to  the  current  notion)  holds  them  justified  in 
doing  this,  and  condemns  all  interference  with  them  as 
inequitable.  Penalties  upon  usury  are  proved  by  political 
economy  to  be  injurious :  by  the  law  of  equal  freedom 
they  are  prohibited  as  involving  an  infringement  of  rights. 
According  to  political  economy,  machinery  is  beneficial  to 
the  people,  rather  than  hurtful  to  them :  in  unison  with 
this  the  law  of  equal  freedom  forbids  all  attempts  to  re 
strict  its  use.  One  of  the  settled  conclusions  of  political 
economy  is,  that  wages  and  prices  cannot  be  artificially 
regulated :  meanwhile  it  is  an  obvious  inference  from  the 
law  of  equal  freedom  that  no  artificial  regulation  of  them 
is  morally  permissible.  We  are  taugiit  by  political  econ 
omy  that  to  be  least  injurious  taxation  must  be  direct : 
coincidently  we  find  that  direct  taxation  is  the  only  kind 
of  taxation  against  which  the  law  of  equal  freedom  does 
not  unconditionally  protest  (p.  231).  On  sundry  other 
questions,  such  as  the  hurtfulness  of  tamperings  with  cur 
rency,  the  futility  of  endeavours  to  permanently  benefit 
one  occupation  at  the  expense  of  others,  the  impropriety 
of  legislative  interference  with  manufacturing  processes, 
&c.,  the  conclusions  of  political  economy  are  similarly  at 


502  SUMMARY. 

one  with  the  dictates  of  this  law.  And  thus  the  laboured 
arguments  of  Adam  Smith  and  his  successors  are  fore 
stalled,  and  for  practical  purposes  made  needless,  by  the 
simplest  deductions  of  fundamental  morality:  a  fact, 
which,  perhaps,  will  not  be  duly  realized  until  it  is  seen 
that  the  inferences  of  political  economy  are  true,  only 
because  they  are  discoveries  by  a  roundabout  process  of 
what  the  moral  law  commands. 

§  5.  Moreover,  the  proposed  theory  includes  a  phi 
losophy  of  civilization.  Whilst  in  its  ethical  aspect  it  ig 
nores  evil,  yet  in  its  psychological  aspect  it  shows  how 
evil  disappears.  Whilst,  as  an  abstract  statement  of  what 
conduct  should  b'e,  it  assumes  human  perfection — is,  in 
fact,  -the  law  of  that  perfection — yet,  as  a  rationale  of 
moral  phenomena,  it  explains  why  conduct  is  becoming 
what  it  should  be,  and  why  the  process  through  which 
humanity  has  passed  was  necessary. 

Thus  we  saw  that  the  possessio^  by  the  aboriginal  man 
of  a  constitution  enabling  him  to  appreciate  and  act  up  to 
the  principles  of  pure  rectitude  would  have  been  detri 
mental,  and  indeed  fatal  (p.  448).  We  saw  that  in  ac 
cordance  with  the  law  of  adaptation,  the  faculties  respond 
ing  to  those  principles  began  to  unfold  as  soon  as  the  con 
ditions  of  existence  called  for  them.  From  time  to  time 
it  has  been  shown  that  the  leading  incidents  of  progress 
indicate  the  continued  development  of  these  faculties. 
That  supremacy  of  them  must  precede  the  realization  of 
the  perfect  state,  has  been  implied  in  numerous  places. 
And  the  influence  by  which  their  ultimate  supremacy  is 
ensured  has  been  pointed  out  (Chap.  II.). 

So  that  though  one  side  of  the  proposed  theory,  in  ex 
hibiting  the  conditions  under  which  alone  the  Divine  Idea 
may  be  realized,  overlooks  the  existing  defects  of  man 
kind  ;  the  other  side,  in  exhibiting  the  mental  properties 


UNITY   OF   MOEAL   AND   PHYSIOLOGICAL   TKUTfT.       503 

requisite  for  fulfilling  these  conditions,  shows  what  civili 
zation  essentially  is;  why  it  was  needful;  and  explains 
for  us  its  leading  traits. 

§  6.  Finally,  there  is  the  fact  lately  alluded  to,  that 
moral  truth,  as  now  interpreted,  proves  to  be  a  develop 
ment  of  physiological  truth ;  for  the  so-called  moral  law 
is  in  reality  the  law  of  complete  life.  As  more  than  once 
pointed  out,  a  total  cessation  in  the  exercise  of  faculties 
is  death ;  whatever  partially  prevents  their  exercise,  pro 
duces  pain  or  partial  death ;  and  only  when  activity  is 
permitted  to  all  of  them,  does  life  become  perfect.  Lib 
erty  to  exercise  the  faculties  being  thus  the  first  condition 
of  life,  and  the  extension  of  that  liberty  to  the  furthest 
point  possible  being  the  condition  of  the  highest  life  pos 
sible,  it  follows  that  the  liberty  of  each,  limited  only  by 
the  like  liberty  of  all,  is  the  condition  of  complete  life  as 
applied  to  mankind  at  large. 

Nor  is  this  true  of  mankind  in  their  individual  capaci 
ties  only:  it  is  equally  true  of  them  in  their  corporate  capa 
city  ;  seeing  that  the  vitality  which  a  community  exhibits 
is  high  or  low  according  as  this  condition  is  or  is  not  ful 
filled.  For,  as  the  reader  no  doubt  observed  in  the  course 
of  our  late  analysis,  those  superior  types  of  social  organi 
zation,  characterized  by  the  mutual  dependence  of  their 
respective  parts,  are  possible  only  in  as  far  as  their  respec 
tive  pa*rts  can  confide  in  each  other ;  that  is,  only  in  as  far 
as  men  behave  justly  to  their  fellows;  that  is,  only  in  as 
far  as  they  obey  the  law  of  equal  freedom. 

Hence,  broadly  generalizing,  as  it  does,  the  prerequi 
sites  of  existence,  both  personal  and  social — being  on  the 
one  hand  the  law  under  which  each  citizen  may  attain 
complete  life,  and  on  the  other  hand  being,  not  figura 
tively,  but  literally,  the  vital  law  of  the  social  organism — • 
being  the  law  under  which  perfect  individuation,  both  of 


504:  CONCLUSION. 

man  and  of  society,  is  achieved — being,  therefore,  the  law 
of  that  state  toward  which  creation  tends — the  law  of  equal 
freedom  may  properly  be  considered  as  a  law  of  nature. 

§  7.  Having  now  briefly  reviewed  the  arguments — 
having  called  to  mind  that  our  first  principle  is  arrived 
at  by  several  independent  methods  of  inquiry — that  it 
unfolds  into  a  system,  uniting  in  one  consistent  whole, 
theories,  some  of  which  seem  conflicting,  and  others  unre 
lated — that  it  not  only  gives  a  scientific  derivation  to  the 
leading  precepts  of  morality,  but  includes  them  along  with 
the  laws  of  state-duty  under  one  generalization — that  it 
utters  injunctions  coinciding  with  those  of  political  econ 
omy — that  civilization  is  explicable  as  the  evolution  of 
a  being  capable  of  conforming  to  it — that,  as  the  law  of 
complete  life,  it  is  linked  with  those  physical  laws  of  which 
life  is  the  highest  product — and  lastly,  that  it  possesses 
such  multiplied  relationships,  because  it  underlies  the  man 
ifestations  of  life — having  called  to  mind  these  things,  the 
reader  will  perhaps  find  the  rays  of  evidence  thus  brought 
to  a  focus,  sufficient  to  dissipate  the  doubts  that  may  hith 
erto  have  lingered  with  him. 


CHAPTER    XXXII. 

CONCLUSION. 

§  1.  A  few  words  are  needful  respecting  the  atti 
tude  to  be  assumed  toward  the  doctrines  that  have  been 
enunciated.  Probably  many  will  eagerly  search  out  ex 
cuses  for  disregarding  the  restraints  set  up  by  the  moral 
law  as  herein  developed.  The  old  habit  of  falling  back 
upon  considerations  of  expediency — a  habit  which  men 


UNYIELDING   KEQUISITIONS    OF   THE   ARGUMENT.       505 

followed  long  Before  it  was  apotheosized  by  Paley — will 
still  have  influence.  Although  it  has  been  shown  that 
the  system  of  deciding  upon  conduct  by  direct  calculation 
of  results  is  a  fallacious  one — although  the  plea  that,  how 
ever  proper  certain  rules  of  action  may  be,  occasional  ex 
ceptions  are  necessary,  has  been  found  hollow  (Lemma 
II.),  yet  we  may  anticipate  further  apologies  for  disobedi 
ence,  on  the  score  of  "  policy."  Amongst  other  reasons 
for  claiming  latitude,  it  will  very  likely  be  urged  that, 
whereas  the  perfect  moral  code  is  confessedly  beyond  the 
fulfilment  of  imperfect  men,  some  other  code  is  needful  for 
our  present  guidance.  Not  what  is  theoretically  right, 
but  what  is  the  best  course  practicable  under  existing 
circumstances,  will  probably  be  insisted  on  as  the  thing 
to  be  discovered.  Some  again  may  argue,  that  whichever 
line  of  conduct  produces  the  greatest  benefit  as  matters 
stand,  if  not  positively  right,  is  still  relatively  so ;  and  is, 
therefore,  for  the  time  being,  as  obligatory  as  the  abstract 
law  itself.  Or  it  will  perhaps  be  said,  that  if,  with  human 
nature  what  it  now  is,  a  sudden  rearrangement  of  society 
upon  the  principles  of  pure  equity  would  produce  disas 
trous  results,  it  follows  that,  until  perfection  is  reached, 
some  discretion  must  be  used  in  deciding  how  far  these 
principles  shall  be  carried  out.  And  thus  may  we  expect 
to  have  expediency  reasserted  as  at  least  the  temporary 
law,  if  not  the  ultimate  one.  Let  us  examine  these  posi 
tions  in  detail. 

§  2.  To  say  that  the  imperfect  man  requires  a  moral 
code  which  recognizes  his  imperfection  and  allows  for  it, 
seems  at  first  sight  reasonable.  But  it  is  not  really  so. 
Wherever  such  a  code  differs  from  the  perfect  code,  it 
must  so  differ  in  being  less  stringent ;  for  as  it  is  argued 
that  the  perfect  code  requires  so  modifying  as  to  become 
possible  of  fulfilment  by  existing  men,  the  modification 
22 


506  CONCLUSION. 

must  consist  in  omitting  its  hardest  injunctions.  So  that 
instead  of  saying — "Do  not  transgress  at  all,"  it  is  pro 
posed,  in  consideration  of  our  weakness,  to  say — "  Trans 
gress  only  in  such  and  such  cases."  Stated  thus,  the 
proposition  almost  condemns  itself;  seeing  that  it  makes 
morality  countenance  acts  which  are  confessedly  im 
moral. 

Passing  by  this,  however,  suppose  we  inquire  what  ad 
vantage  is  promised  by  so  lowering  the  standard  of  con 
duct.  Can  it  be  -supposed  that  men  will  on  the  whole  come 
nearer  to  a  full  discharge  of  duty  when  the  most  difficult 
part  of  this  duty  is  not  insisted  on  ?  Hardly :  for  whilst 
performance  so  commonly  falls  below  its  aim,  to  bring 
down  its  aim  to  the  level  of  possibility,  must  be  to  make 
performance  fall  below  possibility.  Is  it  that  any  evil 
will  result  from  endeavouring  after  a  morality  of  which 
we  ape  as  yet  but  partially  capable  ?  ISTo ;  on  the  con 
trary,  it  is  only  by  perpetual  aspiration  after  what  has 
been  hitherto  beyond  our  reach,  that  advance  is  made. 
And  where  is  the  need  for  any  such  modification  ?  What 
ever  inability  exists  in  us,  will  of  necessity  assert  itself; 
and  in  actual  life  our  code  will  be  virtually  lowered  in 
proportion  to  that  inability.  If  men  cannot  yet  entirely 
obey  the  law,  why,  they  cannot,  and  there  is  an  end  of 
the  matter ;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  we  ought  therefore 
to  stereotype  their  incompetency,  by  specifying  how  much 
is  possible  to  them  and  how  much  is  not.  Nor,  indeed, 
could  we  do  this  were  it  desirable.  Only  by  experiment 
is  it  to  be  decided  in  how  far  each  individual  can  con 
form  ;  and  the  degree  of  conformity  achievable  by  one  is 
not  the  same  as  that  achievable  by  others,  so  that  one 
specification  would  not  answer  for  all.  Moreover,  could  an 
average  be  struck,  it  would  apply  only  to  the  time  being ; 
and  would  be  inapplicable  to  the  time  immediately  suc 
ceeding.  Hence  a  system  of  morals  which  shall  recognize 


THE   MOEAL    STAND AED   MUST   NOT   BE   LOWERED.     507 

man's   present   imperfections  and  allow  for  them  cannot 
be  devised;  and  would  be  useless  if  it  could  be  devised. 

§  3.  Those  who,  by  way  of  excusing  a  little  politic 
disobedience,  allege  their  anxiety  to  be  practical,  will  do 
well  to  weigh  their  words  a  little.  By  "  practical,"  is 
described  some  mode  of  action  productive  of  benefit ;  and 
a  plan  which  is  specially  so  designated,  as  contrasted  with 
others,  is  one  assumed  to  be,  on  the  whole,  more  beneficial 
than  such  others.  Now  this  that  we  call  the  moral  law  is 
simply  a  statement  of  the  conditions  of  beneficial  action. 
Originating  in  the  primary  necessities  of  things,  it  is  the 
development  of  these  into  a  series  of  limitations  within  which 
all  conduct  conducive  to  the  greatest  happiness  must  be 
confined.  To  overstep  such  limitations  is  to  disregard  these 
necessities  of  things — to  fight  against  the  constitution  of 
nature.  In  other  words,  to  plead  the  desire  of  being  prac 
tical,  as  a  reason  for  transgressing  the  moral  law,  is  to 
assume  that  in  the  pursuit  of  benefit  we  must  break 
through  the  bounds  within  which  only  benefit  is  obtainable. 

What  an  insane  notion  is  this  that  we  can  advantage 
ously  devise,  and  arrange,  and  alter,  in  ignorance  of  the 
inherent  conditions  of  success;  or  that  knowing  these  con 
ditions  we  may  slight  them !  In  the  field  and  the  work 
shop  we  show  greater  wisdom.  We  have  learnt  to  re 
spect  the  properties  of  the  substances  with  which  we  deal. 
Weight,  mobility,  inertia,  cohesion,  are  universally  recog 
nized — are  virtually,  if  not  scientifically,  understood  to  be 
essential  attributes  of  matter;  and  none  but  the  most 
hopeless  of  simpletons  disregard  them.  In  morals  and 
legislation,  however,  we  behave  as  though  the  things 
dealt  with  had  no  fixed  properties,  no  attributes.  We 
do  not  inquire  respecting  this  human  nature  what  are  the 
laws  under  which  its  varied  phenomena  may  be  general 
ized,  and  accommodate  our  acts  to  them.  We  do  not  ask 


508  CONCLUSION. 

what  constitutes  life,  or  wherein  happiness  properly  con 
sists,  and  choose  our  measures  accordingly.  Yet,  is  it  not 
unquestionable  that  of  man,  of  life,  of  happiness,  certain 
primordial  truths  are  predicable  Avhich  necessarily  under 
lie  all  right  conduct?  Is  not  gratification  uniformly  due 
to  the  fulfilment  of  their  functions  by  the  respective  fac 
ulties  ?  Does  not  each  faculty  grow  by  exercise,  and 
dwindle  from  disuse  ?  And  must  not  the  issue  of  every 
scheme  of  legislation  or  culture,  primarily  depend  upon 
the  regard  paid  to  these  facts  ?  Surely  it  is  but  reason 
able,  before  devising  measures  for  the  benefit  of  society, 
to  ascertain  what  society  is  made  of.  Is  human  nature 
constant,  or  is  it  not  ?  If  so,  why  ?  If  not,  why  not  ? 
Is  it  in  essence  always  the  same  ?  then  what  are  its  per 
manent  characteristics  ?  Is  it  changing  ?  then  what  is 
the  nature  of  the  change  it  is  undergoing  ?  what  is  it  be 
coming,  and  why  ?  Manifestly  the  settlement  of  these 
questions  ought  to  precede  the  adoption  of  "practical 
measures."  The  result  of  such  measures  cannot  be  mat 
ter  of  chance.  The  success  or  failure  of  them  must  be 
determined  by  their  accordance  or  discordance  with  cer 
tain  fixed  principles  of  things.  What  folly  is  it,  then,  to 
ignore  these  fixed  principles  !  Call  you  that  "  practical " 
to  begin  your  twelfth  book  before  learning  the  axioms  ? 

§  4.  But  if  we  are  not  as  yet  capable  of  entirely  ful 
filling  the  perfect  law,  and  if  our  inability  renders  needful 
certain  supplementary  regulations,  then,  are  not  these 
supplementary  regulations,  in  virtue  of  their  beneficial 
effects,  ethically  justifiable  ?  and  if  the  abolition  of  them, 
on  the  ground  that  they  conflict  with  abstract  morality, 
would  be  disadvantageous,  then,  are  they  not  of  higher 
authority,  for  the  time  being,  than  the  moral  law  itself? — 
must  not  the  relatively  right  take  precedence  of  the  posi 
tively  right  ? 


THE   OFFICE   OF   INSTITUTIONS.  509 

The  confident  air  with  which  this  question  seems  to 
claim  an  affirmative  answer  is  somewhat  rashly  assumed. 
It  is  not  true  that  the  arrangement  best  adapted  to  the 
time,  possesses,  in  virtue  of  its  adaptation,  any  independ 
ent  authority.  Its  authority  is  not  original,  but  derived. 
Whatsoever  respect  is  due  to  it,  is  due  to  it  only  as  a  par 
tial  embodiment  of  the  moral  law.  The  whole  benefit  con 
ferred  by  it  is  attributable  to  the  fulfilment  of  that  portion 
of  the  moral  law  which  it  enforces.  For  consider  the 
essential  nature  of  all  advantages  obtained  by  any  such 
arrangement.  The  use  of  every  institution  is  to  aid  men 
in  the  achievement  of  happiness.  Happiness  consists  in 
the  due  exercise  of  faculties.  Hence  an  institution  suited 
to  the  time,  must  be  one  which  in  some  way  or  other  en 
sures  to  men  more  facility  for  the  exercise  of  faculties — 
that  is,  greater  freedom  for  such  exercise — than  they 
would  enjoy  without  it.  Thus,  if  it  be  asserted  of  a  giv 
en  people  that  a  despotism  is  at  present  the  best  form  of 
government  for  them,  it  is  meant  that  the  exercise  of  fac 
ulties  is  less  limited  under  a  despotism,  than  it  would  be 
limited  under  the  anarchical  state  entailed  by  any  other 
form  of  government ;  and  that,  therefore,  despotism  gives  to 
such  a  people  an  amount  of  liberty  to  exercise  the  facul 
ties  greater  than  they  would  possess  in  its  absence.  Simi 
larly,  all  apologies  that  can  be  made  for  a  narrow  suffrage, 
for  censorship  of  the  press,  for  restraint  by  passports,  and 
the  like,  resolve  themselves  into  assertions  that  the  preser 
vation  of  public  order  necessitates  these  restrictions — 
that  social  dissolution  would  ensue  on  their  abolition — 
that  there  would  arise  a  state  of  universal  aggression  by 
men  on  each  other — or,  in  other  words,  that  the  law  of 
equal  freedom  is  less  violated  by  the  maintenance  of 
these  restrictions,  than  it  would  be  violated  were  they 
repealed. 

If,  then,  the  only  excuse  to  be  made  for  measures  of 


510  CONCLUSION. 

temporary  expediency  is,  that  they  get  the  commands  of 
the  moral  law  fulfilled  better  than  any  other  measures 
can,  their  authority  may  no  more  be  compared  with  that 
of  the  moral  law  itself,  than  the  authority  of  a  servant 
with  that  of  a  master.  Whilst  a  conductor  of  force  is  in 
ferior  to  a  generator  of  it — whilst  an  instrument  is  inferior 
to  the  will  which  guides  it,  so  long  must  an  institution  be 
inferior  to  the  law  whose  ends  it  subserves,  and  so  long 
must  such  institution  bend  to  that  law  as  the  agent  to  his 
principal. 

And  here  let  it  be  remarked,  that  we  shall  avoid  much 
confusion  by  ceasing  to  use  the  word  right  in  any  but  its 
legitimate  sense ;  that,  namely,  in  which  it  describes  con 
duct  purely  moral,  ^tightness  expresses  of  actions,  what 
straightness  does  of  lines ;  and  there  can  no  more  be  two 
kinds  of  right  action  than  there  can  be  two  kinds  of 
straight  line.  If  we  would  keep  our  conclusions  free  from 
ambiguity,  we  must  reserve  the  term  we  employ  to  signify 
absolute  rectitude,  solely  for  this  purpose.  And  when  it 
is  needful  to  express  the  claims  of  imperfect,  though  bene 
ficial,  institutions,  we  must  speak  of  them,  not  as  "  rela 
tively  right,"  or  "  right  for  the  time  being,"  but  as  the 
least  wrong  institutions  now  possible. 

§  5.  The  admission  that  social  arrangements  can  be 
conformed  to  the  moral  law  only  in  as  far  as  the  people 
are  themselves  moral,  will  probably  be  thought  a  sufficient 
plea  for  claiming  liberty  to  judge  how  far  the  moral  law 
may  safely  be  acted  upon.  For  if  congruity  between 
political  organization  and  popular  character  is  necessary ; 
and  if,  by  consequence,  a  political  organization  in  advance 
of  the  age  will  need  modification  to  make  it  fit  the  age ; 
and  if  this  process  of  modification  must  be  accompanied 
by  great  inconvenience,  and  even  suffering ;  then  it  would 
seem  to  follow  that  for  the  avoidance  of  these  evils  our 


FUNCTIONS   OF    CONSERVATISM   AND   RADICALISM.      511 

endeavour  should  Ibe  to  at  first  adapt  such  organization 
to  the  age.  That  is  to  say,  men's  ambition  to  realize 
an  ideal  excellence  must  be  checked  by  prudential  consid 
erations. 

"Progress,  and  at  the  same  time  resistance," — that 
celebrated  saying  of  M.  Guizot,  with  which  the  foregoing 
position  is  in  substance  identical — no  doubt  expresses 
a  truth ;  but  not  at  all  the  order  of  truth  usually  sup 
posed.  To  look  at  society  from  afar  off,  and  to  perceive 
that  such  and  such  are  the  principles  of  its  development, 
is  one  thing :  to  adopt  these  as  rules  for  our  daily  gov 
ernment,  will  turn  out  on  examination  to  be  quite  a  differ 
ent  thing.  Just  as  we  saw  that  it  is  very  possible  for  the 
attainment  of  greatest  .happiness  to  be  from  one  point  of 
view  the  recognized  end  of  morality,  and  yet  to  be  of  no 
value  for  immediate  guidance  (Chap.  III.),  so,  it  is  very 
possible  for  "  progress,  and  at  the  same  time  resistance," 
to  be  a  law  of  social  life,  without  being  a  law  by  which 
individual  citizens  may  regulate  their  actions. 

That  the  aspiration  after  things  as  they  should  be, 
needs  restraining  by  an  attachment  to  things  as  they  are, 
is  fully  admitted.  The  two  feelings  answer  to  the  two 
sides  of  our  present  mixed  nature — the  side  on  which  we 
continue  adapted  to  old  conditions  of  existence,  and  the 
side  on  which  we  are  becoming  adapted  to  new  ones. 
Conservatism  defends  those  coercive  arrangements  which 
a  still-lingering  savageness  makes  requisite.  Radicalism 
endeavours  to  realize  a  state  more  in  harmony  with  the 
character  of  the  ideal  man.  The  strengths  of  these  senti 
ments  are  proportionate  to  the  necessity  for  the  institu 
tions  they  respond  to.  And  the  social  organization  proper 
for  a  given  people  at  a  given  time,  will  be  one  bearing  the 
impress  of  these  sentiments  in  the  ratio  of  their  prevalence 
amongst  that  people  at  that  time.  Hence  the  necessity 
for  a  vigorous  and  constant  manifestation  of  both  of  them. 


512  CONCLUSION. 

Whilst",  on  the  one  hand,  love  of  what  is  abstractedly  just, 
indignation  against  every  species  of  aggression,  and  en 
thusiasm  on  behalf  of  reform, -are  to  be  rejoiced  over;  we 
must,  on  the  other  hand,  tolerate,  as  indispensable,  these 
displays  of  an  antagonistic  tendency  ;  be  they  seen  in  the 
detailed  opposition  to  every  improvement,  or  in  the  puerile 
sentimentalisms  of  Young  England,  or  even  in  some  fran 
tic  eifort  to  bring  back  the  age  of  hero-worship.  Of  all 
these  nature  has  need,  so  long  as  they  represent  sincere 
beliefs.  From  time  to  time  the  struggle  eventuates  in 
change ;  and  by  composition  of  forces  there  is  produced 
a  resultant,  embodying  the  right  amount  of  movement 
in  the  right  direction.  Thus  understood,  then,  the 

O  7  / 

theory  of  "  progress,  and  at  the  same  time  resistance,"  is 
correct. 

Mark  now,  however,  that  for  this  resistance  to  be  bene 
ficial,  it  must  come  from  those  who  think  the  institutions 
they  defend  really  the  best,  and  the  innovations  proposed 
absolutely  wrong.  It  must  not  come  from  those  who 
secretly  approve  of  change,  but  think  a  certain  opposition 
to  it  expedient.  For  if  the  true  end  of  this  conflict  of 
opinion  is  to  keep  social  arrangements  in  harmony  with 
the  average  character  of  the  people ;  and  if  (rejecting  that 
temporary  kind  of  opinion  generated  by  revolutionary 
passion)  the  honest  opinion  held  by  each  man  of  any  given 
state  of  things  is  not  an  intellectual  accident,  but  indicates 
a  preponderating  fitness  or  unfitness  of  that  state  of  things 
to  his  moral  condition  (pp.  265,  465) ;  then  it  follows  that 
only  by  a  universal  manifestation  of  honest  opinions  can 
harmony  between  social  arrangements  and  the  average 
popular  character  be  preserved.  If,  concealing  their  real 
sympathies,  some  of  the  movement  party  join  the  station 
ary  party,  merely  with  the  view  of  preventing  too  rapid 
an  advance,  they  must  inevitably  disturb  the  adaptation 
between  the  community  and  its  institutions.  So  long  as 


ARTIFICIAL   CONSERVATISM.  513 

the  natural  conservatism  ever  present  in  society  is  left  to 
restrain  the  progressive  tendency,  things  will  go  right  ; 
but  add  to  this  natural  conservatism  an  artificial  conserva 
tism  —  a  conservatism  not  founded  on  love  of  the  old,  but 
on  a  theory  that  conservatism  is  needful  —  and  the  proper 
ratio  between  the  two  forces  is  destroyed  ;  the  resultant 
is  no  longer  in  the  right  direction;  and  the  effect  produced 
by  it  is  more  or  less  vitiated.  Whilst,  therefore,  there  is 
truth  in  the  belief  that  "  progress,  and  at  the  same  time 
resistance,"  is  the  law  of  social  change,  there  is  a 


error  in  the  inference  that  resistance  should  be  factitiously 
created.     It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  this  is  the  kind  of  re 
sistance  called  for  ;  and,  as  M.  Guizot's  own  experience 
testifies,  it  is  a  further  mistake  to  suppose  that  any  one/  f  «^ 
can  say  how  far  resistance  should  be  carried. 

But,  indeed,  without  entering  upon  a  criticism  like 
this,  the  man  of  moral  insight  sees  clearly  enough  that  no 
such  self-contradicting  behaviour  can  answer.  Successful 
methods  are  always  genuine,  sincere.  The  affairs  of  the/ 
universe  are  not  carried  on  after  a  system  of  benign 
double-dealing.  In  nature's  doings  all  things  show  their  j-f  t 
true  qualities  —  exert  whatsoever  of  influence  is  really  in 
them.  It  is  manifest  that  a  globe  built  up  partly  of  sem 
blances  instead  of  facts,  would  not  be  long  on  this  side 
chaos.  And  it  is  certain  that  a  community  composed 
of  men  whose  acts  are  not  in  harmony  with  their 
innermost  beliefs,  will  be  equally  unstable.  To  know 
in  our  hearts  that  some  proposed  measure  is  essentially 
right,  and  yet  to  say  by  our  deeds  that  it  is  not  right, 
will  never  prove  really  beneficial.  Society  cannot  pros 
per  by  lies. 

§  6.  And  yet  it  will  still  be  thought  unreasonable 
to  deny  discretionary  power  in  this  matter.  Neglecting 
prudential  considerations  in  the  endeavour  to  put  society 

09* 


514  CONCLUSION. 

on  a  purely  equitable  basis,  will  probably  be  demurred 
to,  as  implying  an  entire  abandonment  of  private  judg 
ment.  It  must  be  confessed  that  it  does  so.  But  whoso 
urges  this  objection,  may  properly  ask  himself  how  much 
his  private  judgment,  as  applied  to  such  a  subject,  is 
worth  ? 

What  is  the  question  he  proposes  to  solve  ?  Whether 
it  is,  or  is  not,  the  time  for  some  desired  change  to  be 
made  ? — whether  the  people  are,  or  are  not,  fit  for  some 
higher  social  form  than  they  have  hitherto  lived  under  ? 
Where  now  are  his  qualifications  for  answering  this  ques 
tion  ?  Has  he  ever  seen  the  millions  for  whom  he  would 
prescribe?  Some  tenth  part  of  them  perhaps.  How 
many  of  these  does  he  recognize  ?  Probably  of  one  or 
two  thousand  he  can  tell  you  the  names  and  occupations. 
But  with  how  many  of  these  is  he  acquainted  ?  Several 
hundreds,  it  may  be.  And  of  what  fraction  of  them  does 
he  personally  know  the  characters  ?  They  are  numbered 
by  tens.  Then  it  must  be  by  what  he  reads  in  books  and 
newspapers,  witnesses  at  meetings,  and  hears  in  conversa 
tion  that  he  judges  ?  Partly  so :  from  the  salient  points 
of  character  thus  brought  under  his  notice,  he  infers  the 
rest.  Does  he  then  find  his  inferences  trustworthy  ?  On 
the  contrary,  when  he  goes  amongst  men  he  has  read  of, 
or  heard  described,  it  usually  turns  out  that  he  has  got 
quite  a  wrong  impression  of  them.  Does  this  evidence 
from  which  he  judges  lead  all  persons  to  like  conclusions  ? 
No  :  with  the  same  sources  of  information  open  to  them, 
others  form  opinions  of  the  people  widely  different  from 
those  he  holds.  Are  his  own  convictions  constant  ?  Not 
at  all :  he  continually  meets  with  facts  which  prove  that 
he  had  generalized  on  insufficient  data ;  and  which  compel 
a  revision  of  his  estimate.  Nevertheless,  may  it  not  be 
that  by  averaging  the  characters  of  those  whom  he  per 
sonally  knows,  he  can  form  a  tolerably  correct  opinion  of 


PRESUMPTUOUS   JUDGMENTS.  515 

those  whom  he  does  not  know?  Hardly:  seeing  that 
of  those  whom  he  personally  knows,  his  judgments  are 
generally  incorrect.  Very  intimate  friends  occasionally 
astound  him  by  quite  unexpected  behaviour;  even  his 
nearest  relatives — brothers,  sisters,  and  children  do  so : 
nay  indeed,  he  has  but  a  limited  acquaintance  with  him 
self;  for  though  from  time  to  time  he  imagines  very 
clearly  how  he  shall  act  under  certain  new  circumstances, 
it  commonly  happens  that  when  placed  in  these  circum 
stances  his  conduct  is  quite  different  from  that  which  he 
expected. 

Now  of  what  value  is  the  judgment  of  so  circumscribed 
an  intelligence  upon  the  question — Is  the  nation  ready  for 
such  and  such  measures  of  reform,  or  is  it  not  ?  Here  is 
one  who  professes  to  say  of  some  thirty  millions  of  people, 
how  they  will  behave  under  arrangements  a  little  freer 
than  existing  ones.  Yet  nine-tenths  of  these  people  he 
has  not  even  seen ;  can  identify  only  a  few  thousands  of 
them;  personally  knows  but  an  infinitesimal  fraction ;  and 
knows  these  so  imperfectly  that  on  some  point  or  other  he 
finds  himself  mistaken  respecting  nearly  all  of  them. 
Here  is  one  who  cannot  say  even  of  himself  how  cer 
tain  untried  conditions  will  affect  him,  and  yet  who 
thinks  he  can  say  of  a  whole  nation  how  certain  untried 
conditions  will  affect  it !  Surely  there  is  in  this,  a  most 
absurd  incongruity  between  pretension  and  capability. 

When  the  contrast  between  present  institutions  and 
projected  ones  is  very  great — when,  for  example,  it  is  pro 
posed  to  change  at  once  from  pure  despotism  to  perfect 
freedom — we  may,  indeed,  prophesy  with  certainty  that 
the  result  will  not  fulfil  expectation.  For  whilst  the  suc 
cess  of  institutions  depends  on  their  fitness  to  popular 
character,  and  whilst  it  is  impossible  for  popular  char 
acter  to  undergo  a  great  change  all  at  once,  it  must 
follow  that  to  suddenly  substitute  for  existing  institutions 


51C  CONCLUSION. 

others  of  a  quite  opposite  nature,  will  necessitate  unfit- 
ness,  and,  therefore,  failure.  But  it  is  not  in  cases  like 
this  that  the  power  of  judging  is  contended  for.  As  else 
where  shown  (p.  472),  one  of  these  extreme  changes  is 
never  consequent  upon  that  peaceful  expression  of  opinion 
presupposed  by  the  hypothesis  that  the  citizen  should  be 
cautious  in  advocating  reform  ;  on  the  contrary,  it  is 
always  a  result  of  some  revolutionary  passion  which  no 
considerations  of  policy  can  control.  Only  when  an 
amelioration  is  being  peaceably  discussed  and  agitated  for 

—  that  is,  only  when  the  circumstances  prove  its  advent 
at  hand  —  can  the  proposed  discretion  be  exercised  :  and 
then  does  the  right  use  of  this  discretion  imply  an  acquaint 
ance  with    the   people  accurate  enough  to  say  of  them, 
"  Now  they  are  not  fit  ;  "  and,  again,  "  Now  they  are  fit  " 

—  an  acquaintance  which  it  is  preposterous  to  assume  — 
an  acquaintance  which  nothing  short  of  omniscience  can 
possess. 

Who,  then,  is  to  find  out  when  the  time  for  any  given 
change  has  arrived?  No  one:  it  will  find  itself  out.  For 
us  to  perplex  ourselves  with  such  questions,  is  both  need 
less  and  absurd.  The  due  apportionment  of  the  truth  to 
the  time  is  already  provided  for.  That  same  modification 
of  man's  nature  which  produces  fitness  for  higher  social 
forms,  itself  generates  the  belief  that  those  forms  are  right 
(p.  406),  and  by  doing  this  brings  them  into  existence. 
And  as  opinion,  being  the  product  of  character  (pp.  37, 
177,)  must  necessarily  be  in  harmony  with  character,  in 
stitutions  which  are  in  harmony  with  opinion,  must  be  in 
harmony  with  character  also. 


VI  "7-     ^ne  candid  reader  may  now  see  his  way  out  of 

the  dilemma  in  which  he  feels  placed,  between  a  convic 
tion,  on  the  one  hand,  that  the  perfect  law  is  the  only 
safe  guide,  and  a  consciousness,  on  the  other,  that  the  per- 


THE   OFFICE   AND    SACKEDNESS   OF   OPINIONS.  517 

feet  law  cannot  be  fulfilled  by  imperfect  men.  Let  him 
but  duly  realize  the  fact  that  opinion  is  the  agency 
through  which  character  adapts  external  arrangements  to 
itself — that  his  opinion  rightly  forms  part  of  this  agency 
— is  a  unit  of  force,  constituting,  with  other  such  units, 
the  general  power  which  works  out  social  changes — and 
he  will  then  perceive  that  he  may  properly  give  full  utter 
ance  to  his  innermost  conviction;  leaving  it  to  produce 
what  effect  it  may.  It  is  not  for  nothing  that  he  has  in 
him  these  sympathies  with  some  principles,  and  repug 
nance  to  others.  He,  with  all  his  capacities,  and  desires, 
and  beliefs,  is  not  an  accident,  but  a  product  of  the  time. 
Influences  that  have  acted  upon  preceding  generations; 
influences  that  have  been  brought  to  bear  upon  him ;  the 
education  that  disciplined  his  childhood ;  together  with 
the  circumstances  in  which  he  has  since  lived ;  have  con 
spired  to  make  him  what  he  is.  And  the  result  thus 
wrought  out  in  him  has  a  purpose.  He  must  remember 
that  whilst  he  is  a  child  of  the  past,  he  is  a  parent  of  the 
future.  The  moral  sentiment  developed  in  him,  was  in 
tended  to  be  instrumental  in  producing  further  progress  ; 
and  to  gag  it,  or  to  conceal  the  thoughts  it  generates,  is 
to  balk  creative  design.  He,  like  every  other  man,  may 
properly  consider  himself  as  an  agent  through  whom 
nature  works ;  and  when  nature  gives  birth  in  him  to  a 
certain  belief,  she  thereby  authorizes  him  to  profess  and 
to  act  out  that  belief.  For — 

. 
" nature  is  made  better  by  no  mean, 

But  nature  makes  that  mean :  over  that  art 
Which  you  say  adds  to  nature,  is  an  art 
That  nature  makes." 


Not  as  adventitious,  therefore,  will  the  wise  man  regard  I 
the  faith  that  is  in  him — not  as  something  which  may  be  y 
slighted,  and  made  subordinate  to  calculations  of  policy ; 


518  CONCLUSION. 

but  as  the  supreme  authority  to  which  all  his  actions 
should  bend.  The  highest  truth  conceivable  by  him  he 
will  fearlessly  utter;  and  will  endeavour  to  get  em 
bodied  in  fact  his  purest  idealisms:  knowing  that,  let 
what  may  come  of  it,  he  is  thus  playing  his  appointed 
part  in  the  world — knowing  that,  if  he  can  get  done 
the  thing  he  aims  at — well :  if  not — well  also  ;  though 
not  so  well. 

§  8.  And  thus,  in  teaching  a  uniform  unquestioning 
obedience,  does  an  entirely  abstract  philosophy  become 
one  with  all  true  religion.  Fidelity  to  conscience — this  is 
the  essential  precept  inculcated  by  both.  No  hesitation, 
no  paltering  about  probable  results,  but  an  implicit  sub 
mission  to  what  is  believed  to  be  the  law  laid  down  for 
us.  We  are  not  to  pay  lip  homage  to  principles  which 
our  conduct  wilfully  transgresses.  We  are  not  to  follow 
the  example  of  those  who,  taking  "Domine  dirige  nos  " 
for  their  motto,  yet  disregard  the  directions  given,  and 
prefer  to  direct  themselves.  We  are  not  to  be  guilty 
of  that  practical  atheism,  which,  seeing  no  guidance  for 
human  affairs  but  its  own  limited  foresight,  endeavours 
itself  to  play  the  god,  and  decide  what  will  be  good  for 
mankind,  and  what  bad.  But,  on  the  contrary,  we  are  to 
search  out  with  a  genuine  humility  the  rules  ordained  for 
us — are  to  do  unfalteringly,  without  speculating  as  to  con 
sequences,  whatsoever  these  require;  and  we  are  to  do  this 
in  the  belief  that  then,  when  there  is  perfect  sincerity — 
when  each  man  is  true  to  himself — when  every  one  strives 
to  realize  what  he  thinks  the  highest  rectitude — then  must 
all  things  prosper. 


INDEX. 


Adaptation  of  constitution  to  condi 
tions,  74. 

—  of  man  to  circumstances,  75. 

—  the  only  possible  law  for  man,  76. 
Agreement  of  moral   and    political 

economy,  501. 
American    Revolution,   first,   as    an 

ethical  example,  60. 
Analogies  of  the  living  and  social 

organism,  493. 

Application  of  the  first  principle,  128. 
Aristotle,  122. 
Artificial  conservatism,  513. 
Administration  of  justice,   corrupt, 

284. 
Appetite,  variations  of,  102. 


Balance  of  social  forces,  376. 
Barbarism  of  the  desire  to  command, 

180. 

Bentham,  111. 

Belief  the  product  of  character,  177. 
Blackstone  on  the  limit  of  taxation, 

235. 

Boards  of  health,  inefficiency  of,  425. 
Brotherhood  of  nations,  301. 


C 


Carlyle  quoted,  64. 
Cell-growth,  morbid  effects  of,  491. 
Chalmers,  Dr.,  on  political  economy, 
259. 


Character,  right  of  property  in,  161. 

Children's  rights,  191. 

Civilization,  advancing,  higher  scnti- 
^mentsof,  273. 

Claim  to  maintenance,  343. 

Classification  of  the  conditions  to 
happiness,  83. 

Chinese  notion  of  education,  364. 

Command  extinguishes  affection,  184. 

Commerce,  regulation  of,  325. 

Communist  theory,  fallacy  of,  151. 

Competition  in  letter-carrying,  441. 

Complacency  of  the  wealthy  classes, 
251. 

Colonization,  effect  upon  the  abori 
gines,  401 ;  cruelty  to,  403. 

Coercive  education,  200. 

Conclusion,  504. 

Conditions  to  greatest  happiness, 
82. 

Conduct,  false  judgment  of,  253. 

Conformity  of  institutions  to  charac 
ter,  271. 

Construction  of  public  works,  443. 

Conservatism  and  radicalism,  511. 

Conservatism,  artificial,  513. 

Constitution  of  the  state,  240. 

Conventional  feelings,  104. 

Correlated  ameliorations,  461. 

Creative  purpose,  the,  81. 

Crimes  under  the  guise  of  coloniza 
tion,  393. 

Cruel  propensities,  common  root  of, 
451. 

Culture  of  self-restraint,  387. 

Currency  and  postal  arrangements, 
432. 

Currency  system  of  Scotland,  435. 

Charity,  state-established,  347. 


520 


INDEX. 


J) 


Debasing  coinage,  effects  of,  60. 
Defence    of    conventional     distinc 
tions,  125. 

Definition  of  morality,  69. 
Democracy  a  growth,  263. 

—  is  it  practicable,  264. 

—  as  a  higher  social  state,  265. 
Derivation  of  a  first  principle,  91. 
Destructive  propensities  artificially 

prolonged,  453. 
Difficulty   of   popular    cooperation, 

245. 

Discoverers,  rights  of,  157. 
Discipline,  coercive,  evils  of,  207. 
Discipline  of  nature,  352. 
Divine  idea,  and  the  conditions  of  its 

realization,  81. 
Duty  of  the  state,  276. 
Dwellings  for  the  laboring  classes, 

419. 


E 


Earth,  right  to  the,  132. 
East  India  Company,  61. 
Education,  coercive,  200. 

—  of  the  sympathies,  203. 

—  the  true  motives  for,  365. 

—  ideal  of,  with  the  English  higher 

classes,  370. 

—  the  problem  of,  370. 

—  and  crime,  379. 

—  will  not  cure  crime,  383. 

Effect  of  making  justice  accessible, 

287. 

Effects  of  trade-restrictions,  827. 
Employment,  claim  to,  345. 
English  love  of  freedom,  117. 

—  estimation  of  genius,  126. 

—  energy,  and  continental  helpless 

ness,  429. 

Equality  of  rights,  faith  in,  108. 
Ethics,  legitimate  scope  of,  70. 
Evil,  evanescence  of,  73. 

—  in  what  it  consists,  73. 
Exchange,  right  of,  104. 
Expediency  as  a  guide,  98. 


Faculties,  the,  exercise  of,  92. 

—  gratification  of,  113. 

Faith  in  law-schemes,  inexhaustible, 

423. 
Feelings,  necessary  and  incidental, 

103. 


Filmer,  Sir  Robert,  on  arbitrary  gov 
ernment,  123. 
First  function  of  government,  311. 

—  principle,  derivation  of,  91. 
Fletcher,  Joseph,  on  criminal  statis 
tics,  381. 

Freedom  of  action,  the  right  of,  93. 

—  limit  to,  94. 

—  of  contract,  165. 

Free  speech,  right  of,  166. 

Friends,  influence  of  the  society  of, 
117. 

Functions  of  conservatism  and  radi 
calism,  511. 

Function  and  necessity  of  the  sav 
age,  449. 

First  principle  of  equal  freedom,  121. 


Q 


General  considerations,  447. 

Good  and  evil  of  governments  esti 
mated,  293. 

Government,  essential  immorality  of, 
230. 

—  neglects  its  real  duties,  283. 

—  omnipotence,  theory  of,  288. 

—  real  function  of,  296. 

—  first  function  of,  311. 

—  conception  of  education,  363. 
Government  colonization,  390. 
Governmental    machinery,    friction 

of,  307. 
Growth  of  the  conception  of  law,  331. 

—  of  moral  sense,  467. 
Guarantee  of  the  stability  of  democ 
racy,  267. 

Guizot  on  political  machinery,  319.  - 
Guibcrt's  sermons,  122. 


Happiness,  pain  necessary  to,  101. 
—  analysis  of,  91. 

Hero-worship,  the  sentiment  of,  459. 
Heterogeneity  of  political  faiths,  236. 
History,  current  conception  of,  63. 
Homogeneity    of    the    community, 

tendency  to,  256. 

Humanity,  the  final  endowment  of, 
489. 


Ideas,  right  of  property  in,  154. 
Ignorance  among  higher  classes,  257. 

—  of  the  enfranchised,  261. 

—  and  criminality,  380. 


INDEX. 


521 


Indiscriminate  relief,  evils  of,  357. 
Individuality,  progress  of,  475. 
Individuation,  the  law  of,  479. 

—  and  mutual  dependence,  483. 
Infallibility,  assumption  of,  337. 
Institutions,  conformity  to  character, 

271. 

—  are  made  of  men,  289. 

—  law  of  their  change,  431. 

—  correspond  to  men's  natures,  469. 

—  office  of,  509. 

Instinct  of  personal  rights,  110. 
International  arbitration,  300. 
Inventors,  rights  of,  157. 
Implications     of    trade-restrictions, 
329. 


Judgment,  difficulty  of,  99. 

Julian,  Cardinal,  122. 

Justice  and  beneficence,  distinction 

between,  85. 

—  administration  of,  281. 
Jurisprudence,  bearings  of,  281. 


Landowner's  claims,  validity  of,  135. 

—  consequences  of,  139. 
Landlordism  objected  to,  140. 

Law  of   equal  freedom   a    truth  of 

ethics,  122. 
Legislation  cannot  create  moral  force, 

295. 
Legislative  schemes,  miscarriage  of, 

316. 
Liberal    institutions,    conditions   of, 

269. 

Life,  the  simpler  forms  of,  477. 
Limit  to  freedom  of  action,  95. 

—  to  exercise  of  faculties,  97. 

—  of  state  duty,  301. 

—  of  state  functions,  312. 
Locke  on  personal  rights,  145. 

—  on  the  state-clergy,  338. 
Loyalty,  traits  accompanying,  463. 
Lunatic  asylums,  non-coercive  man 
agement  of,  204. 

Lust  of  power,  241. 


Macaulay  on  education,  379. 
Maladministration,  colonial,  399. 
Medical  establishments,   growth  of, 
411. 


Mental  modification,  75. 

Men's  characters  determine  institu 
tions,  291. 

Mill,  J.  S.,  on  state  education,  367. 

Moral  sentiments,  Adam  Smith's  the 
ory  of,  114. 

—  rectitude,  what  it  is  worth,  489. 

—  standards  must  not  be  lowered, 

507. 

Moral  and  physiological  truth,  one 
ness  of,  503. 

Morality,  definition  of,  69. 

Morbid  cell-growth,  effects  of,  491. 

Money  value  of  moral  rectitude,  489. 

Multitudinous  assumptions  of  gov 
ernment,  313. 


N 


Napoleon  I.,  63. 

National  education,  360. 

National  education  and  bigoted  con 
servatism,  373. 

National  character  determines  the 
measure  of  administered  justice, 
287. 

Nature  dealing  with  her  failures,  415. 

Natural  growth  of  society,  427. 

—  processes,  slow,  childish  im 
patience  of,  377. 

Need  of  emotional  education,  385. 

Negative  beneficence,  84. 

Non-conformity  in  civil  affairs,  239. 

Non-resistance,  error  of,  298. 


0 


Old  barbaric  usages,  255. 

Opinions,   office  and  sacredness.  of, 

517. 
—  the   counterpart    of    conditions. 

197. 
Organ  and  function,  301. 


Pain  necessary  to  happiness,  101. 

Parental  love  of  dominion,  211. 

People  holding  medium  opinions, 
138. 

Physiological  and  moral  truth,  unity 
of,  503. 

Physiology,  legitimate  scope  of,  72. 

Political,  connubial,  and  filial  rela 
tionships,  harmony  between, 
198. 


522 


INDEX. 


Political  rights,  217. 

—  rights  of  women,  188. 

—  relations,   men   grow  into   them, 

279. 

—  fetishism,  333. 

—  economy,    general  ignorance   of, 

259. 

—  and  moral  economy,  501. 
Poor  laws,  841. 

Popular  government,  is  it  practi 
cable?  269. 

Positive  beneficence,  84. 

Power  should  be  universally  diffused, 
243. 

—  awe  of,   diminishes  with  civiliza 

tion,  220. 
Predatory    instinct,    usefulness    of, 

455. 
Presumptuous  claims  of  legislatures, 

225,  321. 

—  judgments,  515. 

Private  coin-manufacture,  439. 
Progress  of  individuality,  475. 

—  grounds  of  faith  in,  78. 
Property  in  land,  132. 

—  right  of,  144. 

Protection  from  foreign  aggression, 
297. 

—  of  trades,  61. 

Proudhon,  M.,  on  property,  152. 


B 


Reactions  of  evil  conduct,  487. 

—  of  benevolent  acts,  349. 
Reformers,  encouragement  for,  274. 
Regulation  of  commerce,  325. 
Revenue  from  colonies,  397. 
Religious  establishments,  334. 
Repulsive  forces  in  primitive  societjr, 

219. 

Reputation  is  property,  162. 

Restrictions  of  governmental  func 
tions,  303. 

Revolution,  political,  causes  of, 
321. 

Right  and  policy  as  guides,  62. 

Rights,  equal,  growth  of,  109. 

—  existence  of,  denied,  111. 

—  of  women,  173. 

—  of  property,  144. 

—  of  life  and  personal  liberty,  130. 

—  never  given  up,  227. 

—  what  are  they  ?  172. 

—  of  children,  191. 

—  deficient  sense  of,  471. 
Right  to  ignore  the  state,  229. 

—  of  property  in  ideas,  154. 


Right  of  free  speech,  166. 

—  of  exchange,  164. 

—  of  property  in  character,  161. 

—  to  the  use  of  the  earth,  131. 
Rulers,  selfishness  of,  243. 


S 


Sanitary  supervision,  406. 
Scientific  morality,  office  of,  87. 
Secondary  derivation  of  a  first  prin 
ciple,  107. 
Selfishness  and  power-worship,  465. 

—  indications  of  general,  247. 
Self-adjustment  of  things  inherent, 

323. 

Self-restraint,  cultivation  of,  387. 
Self-control,  education  of,  206. 
Severity,  the  mercy  of,  353. 

—  of  nature's  discipline,  413. 
Slavery  in  the  United  States,  262. 

—  belongs     to    the     savage    state, 

457. 
Social  modifiability  of  man,  77. 

—  state,  conditions  of,  82. 

—  contract,  doctrine  of,  223. 

—  convulsions,  phenomena  of,  473. 

—  functions,  subdivision  of,  495. 

—  organism,  analogies  with  the.  liv 

ing,  493. 

—  development,  tendency  of,  497. 
Society  the  true  owner  of  land,  137. 
Summary,  498. 

Smith,  Adam,  114. 
Sphere  of  woman,  189. 
State-education,  denial  of  the  right 
of,  361. 

—  what    shall  determine   its    limit  ? 

363. 

—  jealousy     and      narrowness     of, 

375. 
State-schools,  quality  of,  369. 

—  schools,  duty  of,  276. 

—  churches,  essentially  popish,  335. 

—  church,    a    political    institution, 

339. 

—  banking,  evils  of,  437. 

—  duty,  limit  of,  301. 

—  assistance,     bad      influence      of, 

309. 

State-medicine,  409. 

Squatter  rights,  134. 

Subordination  of  government  author 
ity,  233. 

Supremacy  of  moral  requirements, 
65. 

Sympathy,  influence  of,  114. 

—  bad  effects  of,  354. 


INDEX. 


523 


Tenures  of  land,  134. 

Tenancy  the  true  land  tenure,  141. 

Tests  of  manhood,  193. 

Titles  to  land,  origin  of,  133. 

Titled  classes,  immorality  of,  248. 

Trade-restrictions,  effects  of,  327. 

Transition  from  the  savage  to  the 

social  state,  355. 
Treatment  of  women  as  an  index  of 

civilization,  179. 
Twofold  evils  of  wrong  acts,  57. 
Tyrant  and  slave  convertible,  118. 


U 


Uneducating  influence  of  the  state, 

389. 
Unequal  rights,  theory  of,  127. 


unity  of  human  interests,  485. 

Unity  of  moral  and  physiological 
truth,  503. 

United  States,  slavery  in,  262. 

Unyielding  requisitions  of  the  argu 
ment,  505. 


Visionary  views  of  reform,  417. 

W 

What  is  it  to  be  moral  ?  277. 
Women,  rights  of,  173. 
Women,  question  of  mental  inferior 
ity  of,  175. 

Working-classes,  immorality  of,  249. 
—  unjust  condemnation  of,  251. 


THE  END. 


80 


(T2555s8)4185-S-87 


JAN  131987    £d 


4~y»M*MQ* 


Uni~?&&V 


BEHEHAL 


